


How to Love a Monster

by Azia (orphan_account)



Category: Over the Garden Wall (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Drug Use, Emotional Manipulation, Honestly This Story Is Trash, M/M, Minor Original Character(s), Not Beta Read, Obsessive Behavior, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-10
Updated: 2014-12-26
Packaged: 2018-02-24 19:48:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 12
Words: 20,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2594165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Azia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When a brother loves, he loves for real. (Even if the cold numbed his thoughts away and he could feel wood traveling up his spine.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Alone

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Stranger](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2579348) by [orphan_account](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account). 

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"From the same source I have not taken_  
>  My sorrow; I could not awaken  
> My heart to joy at the same tone;  
> And all I loved, I loved alone."  
> 

Wirt looked back at Greg. He was dying. With tears clouding his vision, he faced the Beast once more. "I-I'll do it." He managed to stutter out. "I'll light the lantern from now on."

"No!" The Woodsman shouted from the distance.

"Silence." The Beast hissed. He took the fallen lantern and placed it in Wirt's hands. "You shall bare this burden now."

"Don't do this Wirt." Beatrice said from behind him. Wirt wordlessly pulled out the golden bird scissors that Adelaide had left behind. He placed them at Greg's feet.

"Will he be okay?" Wirt asked. Greg was growing paler by the second.

"He'll be fine. Trust me. Now, let's go."

—-

Wirt wasn't sure where he was going or how long he had been following the Beast. Greg and Beatrice were the only things that occupied his mind. Was Greg safe and managed to find his way back home? Was Beatrice able to turn herself and her family back to humans?

The cold air numbed his thoughts away.

"Where are we going?" Wirt asked just to fill the silence.

"What are the symptoms of Stockholm syndrome?"

Wirt was taken aback by the sudden question. He held the lantern up higher. He could not see the Beast. "Um, when a person is held hostage for a certain number of days then they could have this, uh, this _attachment_ to their captor." The Beast hummed in agreement.

"You like poems."

"Yeah, I do, I guess."

"Do you know 'The Raven' by Edgar Allan Poe?"

"I think so. I-It's about the talking raven, right?"

Eyes were suddenly upon Wirt. "I don't wish to speak to you if you're nervous."

"O-okay."

—-

"Hey, look right there! That's Wirt's kid brother!"

The teens led the police to the small boy in the river. He coughed but would not open his eyes. He was quickly rushed to the hospital along with the frog that was in his arms.

"Where's Wirt?"

It did not take them long to find another boy face down in the water. He did not move.

—-

"Do you know what the Unknown is?" Wirt shook his head. "This is the threshold of death."


	2. Miss Rosie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"when I watch you_  
>  you wet brown bag of a woman  
> who used to be the best looking gal in Georgia  
> used to be called the Georgia Rose  
> I stand up  
> through your destruction  
> I stand up."  
> 

The Beast was singing merrily to himself. Wirt was growing weary of songs. He slouched over the lantern and huddled his knees to his chest.

The Beast stopped singing abruptly. "My heart to joy at the same tone," he said.

"And all I loved, I loved alone." Wirt automatically recited. He pushed his knees closer to his body.

"Smart, smart boy." The Beast ran his fingers through Wirt's hair. The sensation was odd. Wirt wouldn't describe the touch as completely human. It felt like the bumpy roots of a tree, yet soft like sap running through the cracks of bark. The touch made him shiver. It was comforting and almost nostalgic to some degree. "An intelligent young man who enjoys poetry." Wirt thought he heard a snap. "Ah, I've got it! Poetry! The theme will be poetry."

Wirt slowly rose to his feet. "Theme of what?" He picked up the lantern and held it in the Beast's general direction.

"The theme of the Unknown. See," the Beast started to walk away. Wirt hurried to follow. "I've decided to make your stay more desirable. I could've made this place Hell for you, but I'm not. You know why?"

Wirt sighed. "Why?"

"Because I'm a nice guy despite what everyone tells you. So while you stay let's make this place a sanctuary, shall we? Poetry will decorate the walls of every home and the rocks on every corner."

"Rocks," Wirt absentmindedly repeated. His brother had carried a rock in his pocket for some reason. The memory made Wirt's heart twinge with homesickness.

"Yes, poetry will be everywhere. And that's a rock fact." One of the Beast's eyes closed in an attempt to wink. "Side effects of prolonged stays in the Unknown: memory loss, dependency personality disorder, extreme depression, and suicide. In that order too."

"Huh?" He couldn't stand when the Beast went from one topic to another. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"You're staying here, correct?"

"Well yeah I'm staying. I'm sort of here for all eternity to light this lantern, remember?" Wirt let the lantern down at his feet. He couldn't wait until sunrise so he wouldn't have to carry it anymore.

"'Stay' can also mean to go somewhere as a visitor or guest." The sun was beginning to peak through the horizon. "You, Wirt, are not going to stay here permanently."

Wirt nearly dropped the lantern in surprise. "I-I'm not?"

"Maybe. I am going to make a deal with you. If you can manage to stay in the Unknown without experiencing any of the side effects that I had named, then I will allow for you to return home and the Woodsman will continue to carry the lantern."

Wirt internally smiled. The deal was simple. He wasn't going to develop "dependent personality disorder." It didn't even sound real. "And if I don't?" He was already feeling cocky.

"Then soul, spirit, mind, and body shall separate, and you will remain here forevermore."

Wirt let his inner smile escape. "Deal."

—-

Greg watched his mother cry from the corner of the hospital room. His frog croaked from the inside of his pocket. It was a miracle that it was allowed into the room.

"Not now Mr. President," Greg whispered. He patted one of the frog's eyes. "Not now."

—-

The Unknown looked slightly different than how Wirt remembered it. It wasn't bright anymore. The hues had been drained and replaced with a grayish, drab color.

He walked the streets anyway to see what this "poetry theme" that the Beast had been rambling on was all about.

_"Ugly!"_

_"Stupid!"_

Wirt's ears perked up. He turned to the yelling.

_"Beautifulest woman in the whole town? As if!"_

_"Ain't nothing but a homeless lady."_

_"I bet nobody even called her Georgia Rose when she was in her so-called 'prime.'"_

Wirt walked closer. A sign that read "Clifton" was buried in the ground. A faded plum was drawn next to the name. Wirt gulped and hoped that it wasn't anything like Pottsville.

A group of people were circled around something. The insults worsened as Wirt drew nearer.

_"Liar, that's all she is."_

_"Should we throw a rock at her?"_

_"I don't know 'bout you, but I am!"_

Wirt pushed through the crowd to see what they were yelling at. An old woman wrapped up in garbage bags was sitting and staring at the crowd. She reeked of rotting food and was only wearing one boot with a hole cut into the toes.

Wirt felt anger rumble from the pit of his stomach. "What's wrong with you guys? She's just an old lady!" Upon turning around, his anger dropped. Everyone in the crowd had bird-like faces. Tens of beady eyes gave Wirt and the old woman an one-thousand-yard stare of pure hatred.

Wirt spun on his heels and forced the old woman to her feet. He was surprised to see that she was shorter than him and was pretty lightweight. "Run, run, run!" He grabbed the woman by the arm and forced her away from the crowd. Once they were in the woods and he was sure that they were safe and not being followed, he stopped.

Wirt paused the catch his breath. The old woman did also. He caught a second look at her. She appeared to be human for the most part.

"Are you all right? They didn't hit you did they?" The woman shook her head.

"Thanks boy." She straightened up.

Wirt nodded. "You're welcome. They called you Georgia Rose. Is that your name?"

"Used to be Georgette Rosalya. Then they called me Georgia Rose for a little while." The woman whistled. "Now they call me Miss Rosie, 'cause I ain't nobody no more."

"Uh, don't say that."

"You heard them. I'm old and I'm ugly. Used to the most beautiful woman in town. Now look at me." Wirt looked at her. He imagined smooth milk chocolate skin instead of the wet paper bag-likeness that hung from her bones; bright, honey eyes full of life and gold instead of sad, dropping, dead eyes; a bright dress instead of garbage bags; dainty shoes instead of a boot and then he could almost see what was once the most beautiful woman in all the town.

"Beauty's on the inside Miss Rosie." Wirt tried to smile. "Want me to help you find someplace to go? The woods aren't really safe I heard." His mind flashed to the Beast.

"It's fine." Miss Rosie gathered up the bags around her waist. "I'll be going alone, like always."

"Oh okay." Wirt felt uneasy. If she wanted to go alone though, there was no stopping her. He watched her walk until she became a speck in the distance.

Wirt nearly tripped over a rock. A face was drawn onto it. Weird. He figured a random kid (or animal, who knows) had doodled on the rock and then dropped it. He walked on.

—-

"You two shouldn't have gone over that damn wall!" Greg winced at his father's words.

—-

The Beast was… cooing. Wirt didn't know how to describe it. The Beast was wrapped around him (somehow) and was cooing nonsensical things into his ear.

"Ah, broken is the golden bowl! The spirit flown forever!" The Beast's tone was dramatic, but his voice continued to stay soft.

"Are we reciting poetry or something?" Wirt couldn't have felt more confused.

"Ah, broken is the golden bowl! The spirit flown forever!" The Beast repeated louder.

"Let the bell toll — a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river?" Wirt was patted on the head.

"So smart, so smart. Your memorization of poetry is astonishing. And that's a rock fact."

"Thanks, I guess?" _Rock fact_? Wirt found that to be a peculiar phrase. Everything was peculiar about the Beast though. "No offense, but you're really weird."

The Beast's eyes cut through the darkness. "I know." With one final stroke through his hair, he was gone.


	3. Richard Cory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"So on we worked, and waited for the light,_  
>  And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;  
> And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,  
> Went home and put a bullet through his head."  
> 

Wirt noticed that the oil in the lantern was beginning to run low. He had no desire to refuel it though. He remembered the concept of lost people turning into trees and then cut down for oil. He wasn't sure if it was true though, since the Woodsman didn't seem mentally sound.

He also vaguely recalled finding a young boy turning to a tree. He doesn't remember when, how, or why though. So perhaps the Woodsman was right. He was right about the Beast, so why not the human-oil thing also?

Wirt held the lantern up towards the Beast. The shadowy figure looked even darker in the low light.

"Why'd you wake me up?" Wirt asked. He stifled his yawn with the back of his hand.

"The ground of the forest is not a proper bed." The Beast blinked slowly, one eye at a time. "I'm sending you off to do a task for me. You will get a place to eat and sleep in the process and I will get to officially conduct my experiment."

"And what's your 'experiment' all about?" Wirt wondered why he even bothered to ask. He was going to learn about it one way or another.

"You." The Beast gestured for him to follow with the tilt of his antlers. "If you happen upon a mirror do not be alarmed. Your appearance is altered, but only temporarily. Because who listens to little boys? Do you?"

"Huh?" Wirt wiped the sleep from his eyes. He hoped that wherever he was being led to was close by. He just wanted to curl up in a ball and return to dreamland. "Sorry. I wasn't listening. Do I what?"

"Pay attention!" Wirt flinched back. "I asked: do you listen to little boys?"

"Uh, not really? I don't really know any little boys, or girls for that matter. I actually," Wirt quickly flipped through his memory bank of the people he did know, "don't really know anybody now that I think about it."

"Oh really? You don't know any little boys at all?"

Wirt set the lantern at his hip. "Not personally. Well, I think I saw this one little boy—looked about seven or eight years old—turning into a tree or something. But that probably was a dream, I'm not too sure."

"Tell me who you do know then."

"Well, uh, I know you. I also know the Woodsman. But I haven't seen him in a while now that I think about it." Wirt was struggling to think. "I think I knew this talking bird too. I don't know what happened to it though."

"Anyone else?"

"Nope, that's it. My only friends are some forest monster, a delusional woodcutter, and a talking bird. Woe is me." Sarcasm and tiredness were practically leaking from Wirt at this point.

Wirt bumped into something. He at first thought it was a tree. When he tried to walk around it, a hand was pressed into his forehead. It took a moment for his sleepy mind to process that he had bumped into the Beast's back (or front; he wasn't too sure about anything anymore).

"The forest monster is not a monster, the delusional woodcutter is not delusional, and the talking bird is no longer a bird." The hand moved to his hair. Wirt suddenly realized that he had lost his hat. It had to happen at least a day ago because the Beast had ran his hands through his hair yesterday also.

"Sorry for getting it wrong then. You're the only thing I've been talking to for a long time."

"How long of a time?"

"I don't really know."

"I see." The hand felt like a gnarly and crumbly patch of tree bark. As the hand traveled down his face, its design and texture changed within seconds. It turned into skin; albeit rough and callused skin, yet skin nonetheless. Wirt was taken by surprise. He didn't know that the Beast was cable of taking different forms.

While the Beast's unexpected human hand resided on his chin and traced the outline of his lips, a random thought came to Wirt's mind. Could the Beast turn into a human? Was he once human?

"Soft," the Beast murmured. His fingers then traced the outline of this cheeks. The shape of Wirt's cheeks felt different. It must have had to do with his "altered appearance." He made note to look at mirror when he got to wherever he needed to go. "Softer," the Beast commented.

"Y-Yeah." He found it weird how he didn't find to urge to pull the Beast's hand from his face. He felt that strange comforting feeling he got whenever his hair was rubbed. The feeling must have been etched into the Beast's hands or something.

The hand stopped at his neck. "We should be on our way now." Wirt felt a slight sadness. He actually didn't mind being caressed by the forest-not-monster.

—-

"How did you like your first glimpse of Clifton?"

"I think that it's as bad as, if not worse, than Pottsville." The Beast hummed. "What's up with those bird-people anyway?"

"They are mockingbirds."

"I could've guessed that. They were about to stone this old lady for being ugly."

"Things are like that sometimes."

"No they're not. Who wants to kill someone over being old?"

"Has it crossed your mind that they might have been helping her?"

"How in the hell were they helping her by killing her?!"

The Beast was suddenly silent. Wirt picked his head up and looked around. The welcoming sign to Clifton was just ahead of him. Scatters of sun dashed through the clouds but did nothing to brighten up the drab and dreary town.

"Beast?" Wirt called out. He was long gone. "Tell somebody when you're leaving next time, all right?"

—-

Wirt didn't see any bird-people as he walked through town. The streets were deserted. Clifton had managed to turn into a ghost town overnight.

He heard a door open from behind him. "Come here!" A voice hissed. Wirt turned around and walked to the house. The man who had yelled at him practically yanked him inside. "What do you think you're doing?"

Wirt shrugged. "I'm just walking down the street."

"No, you can't be doing that now. Somebody just said they saw the Beast by the forest here. Everybody's supposed to be inside right now. You ain't get the memo?"

"I just got here?" Wirt hadn't intended for his sentence to sound like a question. "I'm Wirt by the way. If you wanted to know or, uh, something."

"Richard Cory." The man shook his hand. "But you already knew that."

"I didn't actually. I just got here."

Richard Cory's eyebrows shot up. Wirt wasn't sure if the man was offended or surprised. He decided to go with offended. He had honestly never even heard of someone with a name remotely close to "Richard Cory" before.

"What's a man like you walking around when there's a Beast a-lurking?" Wirt figured a shrug wouldn't do for this question.

"I guess I'm sort of lost. I looked at the Clifton sign and thought this would be a nice place to stay." He felt awkward whenever he lied. But he figured that telling someone that he was affiliated with the Beast would not sit well. He was tempted to say, Man? I barely look like a high-schooler. He was feeling more curious about how he looked.

"Well, that makes sense. A lot of folks in this town were lost. But let me get this straight: you don't know who I am?" Wirt shook his head. "Oh c'mon! I'm the richest man in Clifton and all about the towns around here combined!"

Wirt looked around the house. It was minimally decorated and the walls looked like they had received a fresh coat of white paint recently. "I beg to differ." A faint memory of an older couple with a house so huge that they became lost in it came to Wirt's mind. Was the man related to him? He wasn't sure.

Richard Cory grabbed his arm and pulled him to the only door in the room. The door led to a descending staircase.

What the stairs led to was a different story. The wisp thought of the large house that was in Wirt's mind was gone. There was a colorful, seemingly endless corridor with doors nearly on every inch. In the center was a long table with unique chairs lined up. A chandelier hung above their heads.

"Do you beg to differ now?" Richard Cory sneered. He released Wirt's arm and ran his fingers over his mustache. It was shiny and curled at the edges. Wirt wondered if it was fake.

"Nope." Wirt, still in awestruck, looked at each door. There had to be more than one-hundred. "Do you have a place I can stay? Just for the night."

Richard Cory chuckled and slapped his back. "You can stay as long as you like! Don't mind my family though. None of them really leave their rooms anyway except my sister." Richard Cory's eyes darted at a door that was painted baby blue and had a bronze handle. "She's a little loony, you could say. Supposed to throw her out a couple years back, but I felt bad for her. Don't mind her, all right?"

"All right I guess."

Richard Cory led him down the hall. "Her name's Sayulita. Beautiful gal, but nobody wants her. We'd thought she get married and we'd be done with her, but that ain't the case. Still pretty though. Wait." Richard Cory spun on his heels and pressed his finger into Wirt's chest. "Do you wanna marry Sayulita?"

Wirt nervously smiled. What the hell was the Beast up to? "No, no. I just want to stay the night." Richard Cory was already grabbing his arm and leading him in the opposite direction.

"SAYULITA. MA. PA. GRANNY. GRANDDAD. GET UP. 'CUZ WE GOT A HUSBAND." Wirt winced at how the rich man's voice boomed across the hall.

"How did I get into this mess?" Wirt muttered to himself.

Some of the doors opened. The people who exited grumbled. They were all wearing pajamas.

"What's going on Rich?" An older man asked. "And who's this fella?" He held out his hand toward Wirt. "Morning, I'm Mr. Cory."

"Wirt," Wirt meekly said.

"WHERE IS SAYULITA?" Richard Cory was hit upon the head by a woman who looked older than Miss Rosie.

"Hush up, stupid. You're gonna ruin the patient's sleep."

Richard Cory banged his fist on the baby blue door. "Sayulita, get up! I got you a husband!"

Sayulita was indeed beautiful, Wirt concluded. And she was also indeed loony looking.

Wirt needed to figure out why his memories were so waterlogged. He had to comb deep through his mind to figure out who she looked like.

A book popped into his mind. A photo of an armless statue of a woman was on one of the pages. He couldn't remember anything else but how the statue looked like.

Sayulita resembled the statue. She had a sheet wrapped around her waist and Wirt was scared that she was actually armless until she moved to reveal that she was wearing pitch black gloves from her fingers to her shoulders.

"Sayulita, put some damn clothes on and pack your bags. You're getting married!"

Wirt shook his head. "No, no, no, I'm don't want to marry her. I just want to stay the night."

Richard Cory bellowed with laughter. "He got a sense of humor too. Ain't that great Sayu? You like laughing."

Sayulita's jade eyes scrutinized Wirt. He hoped that she could see through all the nonsense that Richard Cory was yelling.

"Come in, fiancé." She said. Richard Cory pushed him inside. The next time Wirt saw the Beast, he was going to have a long talk with him.


	4. In Flanders Fields

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"In Flanders fields the poppies blow_  
>  Between the crosses, row on row,  
> That mark our place; and in the sky  
> The larks, still bravely singing, fly  
> Scarce heard amid the guns below."  
> 

Greg watched his mother fill the vase provided by the hospital with blood red flowers. "What kind of flowers are those?" He asked.

"Those are poppies." She sighed. His mother always sounded so sad lately. "They mean sleep, peace, and d-dea…" She closed her eyes and shook her head. "When soldiers d-died in battle, a flower crown made out of poppies would be put on their heads so they could rest peacefully."

"Is that a rock fact?"

"Yes, that's a rock fact. We need to find you a new rock, hm?" Greg's mother ran her hands through his hair absentmindedly.

—-

"I'm really sorry about my family." Wirt looked away as Sayulita changed out of her statue costume to a long dress. "And myself too. I wasn't expecting anybody over so I was sort of trying on different outfits." She walked away from her vanity and sat next to Wirt with a loud sigh. "Not like I should be expecting somebody anyway," she muttered.

Wirt looked back at her vanity. "Mind if I use your mirror? Sorry, that's a weird question. Never mind."

Sayulita shook her head. "I don't care. I should give you a tour actually, this room is huge."

"Thanks." Wirt was interested in seeing just how big Richard Cory's house was.

He studied himself in the mirror. His looks weren't changed too drastically. He was barely taller, his nose was slightly longer, his jaw was prominent, his cheeks were more angular but still held their usual downy pinkness, and his hair was darker and longer. He was half-expecting to look like a completely different person, but he just looked older.

Wirt touched the top of his head. He felt incomplete without his hat.

"If you want, I can tell you what's going on while you look around." Wirt noticed that she didn't speak with a drawl like everyone else in Clifton.

"That'll be nice. Thanks." Wirt pressed his hands against his cheeks. He traced over where the Beast had touched them.

"Okay. So they're the Cory's. I'm not. I was adopted by them. But since I'm not like them they've called me crazy and have been trying to get rid of me ever since."

"What do they act like?"

"I can't describe it exactly. They're just weird. This is the first time we've all left our rooms in months. And they were all wearing the same clothes from the last time I saw them." Wirt looked over a shelf with series of snow globes. "That's the happiest I've seen Richard Cory in weeks. A few days ago he would not stop crying at the dining table."

"That's weird. What's wrong with him?"

"That's what I've been trying to figure out for all of my life, but I've got nothing." Sayulita joined him by the snow globe collection. "Did they tell you about the other guy staying here?"

"I don't know."

"He came into town this morning, called himself 'the Woodsman,' and just collapsed at our doorstep. This was right before the Beast sighting, so they must be connected." She picked up an ornament with a model of the sky inside of it. Upon shaking, miniature clouds swirled around the globe. "He also said something about a boy named Wirt. That's you right?"

Wirt scratched the back of his head. Sayulita seemed fine and not as looney as he thought she was. "I was with the Woodsman a few nights ago. I don't really remember what happened though."

Sayulita set the sky globe down. She raised her eyebrows in a manner similar to Richard Cory. "You don't remember?"

"No. I actually can't remember a lot of stuff."

"How about I say some of the names that the Woodsman said and you tell me the first thing that comes to mind?"

"Sure."

"The Woodsman."

"Crazy lunatic that chops down trees for lantern oil."

"Wow. Um, Greg?"

"Greg?" Wirt tapped his fingers along the shelf in thought. "A little boy, I think. The name sounds familiar, but I just don't know."

"Don't strain yourself," Sayulita smiled. "Beatrice."

"Snappy."

"Snappy? Who's Beatrice?"

"You told me not to strain myself." Wirt ran his fingers over a celestial-themed globe. "Anyone else?"

"I don't think he mentioned anyone else other than the Beast, but I'm sure you know who that is." _All too well_ , Wirt thought. "You want to go see the Woodsman? He's staying here, but you have to be quiet."

Wirt nodded. He followed her (he had been playing duckling a lot lately) down the hall. The house was like a labyrinth. The doors in the corridor didn't lead to single rooms, but more hallways.

Sayulita stopped in front of the first door on the left. The room was pus yellow compared to the dark main room. A line of cots, a china cabinet, and a painting of a bowl of plums were the only things that decorated the room.

The Woodsman was lying in the cot farthest from the door. Wirt studied him. His clothes had been replaced with a johnny gown and a crown of blood red flowers were on his head. The Woodsman looked at peace for once.

Wirt pointed at the flowers. "What's with those?"

"Those are poppies. Here." Sayulita pulled out another wreath of poppies from the cabinet. "When you wear them, you go right to sleep. We use them for sick people that pass by to help them rest and heal." She handed the wreath over to Wirt. "If you wear them for too long though, you sleep forever. I'm taking his off in a couple of hours."

Wirt nodded. He hooked the flowers next to his lantern. He went to the cot next to the Woodsman. "I'm just gonna nap for a while, if that's all right."

"That's all right." Sayulita laughed. "When you wake up, could you tell me your full story? Or at least everything that you can remember."

"Okay." Wirt knew that he couldn't.

—-

Greg grabbed Sara's arm after school. "Please Sara! I need somebody to go with me. A frog companion isn't enough."

Sara sadly smiled. "I don't know, Greg. It seems really dangerous over the garden wall. You shouldn't be going there either." She gently extracted her arm from his little hands. "Just go home, okay?" She waved before walking away.

—-

"Wake up boy!" Wirt was shaken awake from his sleep. The Woodsman was back in his normal clothes and was carrying the lantern over his head. "Get up, get the girl, and let's get out of here. This town is dangerous."

Wirt pulled the cot's sheets off of his body and hopped out of bed. The Woodsman took a step back. "How long was I asleep? When did you become a man?"

"I didn't, the Beast—"

"Don't speak of him!" The Woodsman spat on his chin. "He can hear you once you call his name. Now let's go. Hurry up!"

"I'm going, I'm going. Just give me a second."

"No! Let's go."

"Ugh. Will you please stop yelling?"

"No!" The Woodsman grabbed his arm. "Let's go now before the house rearranges itself."

Wirt was dragged out of the room and through the hallway. Sayulita woke up in surprise when they bursted in her room. "What's going on?" Green orbs widened at them in the dark.

"We are escaping!"

"No, we can't." Sayulita jumped out of bed. "The house changes at night and the birds are roaming the streets right now."

"I don't care. We're protected." The Woodsman turned to Wirt. "Right?"

Wirt nodded. "Ah, yeah. Of course we are."

"You have no clue about what I'm taking about, do you?" The Woodsman handed him the lantern and grabbed the both them. "We're protected. Let's go!"

The group paused when they exited the room. The corridor was longer and there were more doors. The dining table was shorter and only had two chairs against it.

Sayulita took a step towards her door. "I told you the house changes. Let's just go ba—"

"No! We have to go now!" The Woodsman went down the east end of the extended hall. Wirt and Sayulita chased after him. The Woodsman had managed to find the exit within seconds. "Hurry up children!"

"Does he always yell?" Wirt helped Sayulita up the stairs.

"I think so."

—-

The Woodsman, Wirt, and Sayulita didn't stop running until they reached the town's edge. The Woodsman pulled the welcome sign from the ground.

"Why'd you do that?" Wirt asked.

"This place has been touched by evil! The entire town has been cursed. Haven't you both noticed?"

"All I've noticed is a bunch of bird-people and a weird house." Wirt hooked the lantern back to his waist.

"Precisely! If one was to die in this town they will turn into a mockingbird with the instinct to seek, kill, and destroy. Bring forth the lantern boy!" Wirt fumbled to unattach the lantern from his hip. The Woodsman held the light over all of their heads. "Let us go into the forest!" And so they went.


	5. Moon, Moon, Crazy Moon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"torn apart and snoring moon;_  
>  lovely moon, romantic moon  
> poor, poor moon  
> the romance  
> plucked out of its drab surface."  
> 

"We must reach water before the sun rises.” The Woodsman was panting. Wirt had taken over leading the group. The woods were confusing, but the Woodsman insisted that the nearest source of water was strictly north. Whenever Sayulita or Wirt tried to ask him why he wanted to go to water so badly, he would begin mumbling incoherently.

"I don't think that he's healed all the way." Sayulita whispered.

Wirt shrugged. "He's been like that since I remembered."

"We both know that your memory isn't the best right now."

Wirt shrugged again. "How well do you know the forest?"

"I've never been in the forest before."

"Never?!" Wirt and Sayulita waited for the Woodsman to catch up to them. "Young lady, you've never been in these woods before?" Sayulita shook her head. "Oh my goodness."

"Is that bad or something?" Sayulita looked between the two men (or man and almost-man). "Is the Bea—"

"Do not speak of his name! He lurks in these woods. I feel his presence in every step that we take. Speed up boy." Wirt hurried his pace. The lantern's light was running even lower. He could barely see the path ahead of him.

Eventually, they reached a clearing. Wirt held the lantern higher. There was tranquil river and a cottage. Wirt led them to the riverbed as quietly as possible. "Do you know who lives there, Woodsman?"

"Your friend that became a bird resides here. The cottage was abandoned the last time I checked, though."

"Do you think it's safe to go in?" Sayulita whispered. A light came on in the cottage. The group jumped back.

"Who's out there?" The voice that called out was frail and frayed.

"Miss Rosie?" Wirt walked to the lit window. Miss Rosie opened up the window all the way. "What are you doing here?"

The old woman leaned against the sill. "The people here are letting me stay for next few days." She gestured toward Sayulita and the Woodsman. "Are you and your friends lost?"

"I think so, yeah." Wirt glanced back at his group. They were staring at him expectantly. He wished that he looked like a boy again. He didn't like making decisions. "Can we, uh, spend the night too? If it's okay with the people that stay here, though."

Miss Rosie nodded. "Go to the door and gimme a second."

—-

Sara took the box of candies from Greg. "How'd you know that cherry was my favorite?" She smiled.

"I don't know. That was all the candy I had left." Greg quietly waited for her to finish chewing. "Do you believe me?"

Her smile faded. "I'm not sure. You guys were underwater for a long time. You might have been hallucinating or something."

Greg jumped to his feet. "You have to Sara! I'm not lying! Wirt's still out there."

Sara pocketed the candies. "I'm really sorry Greg." She glanced down at her watch. "Your mom should be coming back soon. I'll be babysitting you again tomorrow." She ruffled his hair. "I won't tell her what we talked about because she's really stressed out right now."

Greg pushed Sara's hand off of his head. "Just wait until George Washington wakes up from his nap, and you'll believe me."

—-

Wirt was bombarded by children. Grabby hands stuck at his legs from all directions. He patted a random boy's head.

"Oh, I'm so sorry about that." A woman came rushing into the room. "Children, get off of that man this instant!"

"But mom, he's so tall!" One girl said.

"I'm not that tall." Wirt tried to pry some of the children's hands from him. "Could you all let go? I have to walk."

The woman and Miss Rosie pulled the children off of him. "Did you have a growth spurt or something?" Miss Rosie asked. She pulled four kids off of him at once. "You look older."

"Yeah, I guess." Miss Rosie squinted at him. Wirt stared back. "C-Could you stop staring at me?" He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. It was getting hot.

"Do you guys want food?" The woman asked.

The Woodsman set himself at the table. "I haven't eaten in a fortnight." He took his fork and stabbed it into the table. "I'm starving."

"You haven't eaten in two weeks?" The woman gasped. "Of course you're starving. I'll make something right away. Beatrice come here, now!" Wirt's ears perked up.

"Beatrice lives here?" He was pushed into a seat by the children. Sayulita seated herself next to him.

The woman laughed. "Well, she better. If she runs off again, we'd have a problem." She took some of her children's hands and dragged them out of the room. "Beatrice, get up! We have guests!"

"It's not even morning mom. Why are there people over?" A redhead girl yawned and stretched into the room. "What do you need me for?"

"Keep our guests company while I cook. Thank you." Beatrice huffed. She plopped herself at the head of the table.

She yawned again. "Are you guys lost too?"

"You could say that." Wirt answered. Beatrice's eyes widened.

"Wirt, is that you? It's only been a week, how'd you grow so fast?" Wirt shrugged. Beatrice stood from her seat and threw her arms around Wirt. "It's so good to have arms again." Wirt hugged her back. His mind was still foggy, but it managed to connect Beatrice the human and Beatrice the snappy talking bird.

"Why does everybody keep on saying that?" Sayulita asked. Wirt let go of Beatrice.

"Saying what?"

"That you look older. Did something happen?" Wirt shrugged.

"Who's that?" Beatrice asked.

"The boy is apparently going to marry the girl. I could hear her entire family yelling about it in my sleep." The Woodsman extracted the fork from the table and examined it. "I'm not sure why though. The boy would make a horrible husband."

"WIRT, YOU'RE GETTING MARRIED? YOU'RE LIKE SIXTEEN YEARS OLD."

Miss Rosie poked her head into the room. "Settle down." She shot a glare at everyone before leaving.

Beatrice was flustered with anger. "I leave you for a week, and you're married? How did that happen?"

"We're not getting married, Beatrice. Calm down." She looked back and forth between the two of them.

"You better not be." She threw herself back into her seat.

Silence enveloped over the group. Wirt squirmed in his seat. Beatrice seemed upset, Sayulita was oddly quiet, and the Woodsman was still staring at his fork.

"So… how many brothers and sisters do you have?"

"A lot." Beatrice's tone was frosty.

"Oh." Wirt leaned back into his seat. Thankfully, Beatrice's mother and siblings bursted into the room with heaps of food.

The Woodsman immediately piled his plate high with food. Wirt only got a minimal amount of food. Though he hadn't eaten in a while, he didn't feel extremely hungry.

Beatrice's mother took the seat next to Sayulita. "I got a cherry pie in the oven if you guys are still hungry."

"Cherry's my favorite." Sayulita said. Beatrice's mother patted her shoulder.

"Mine's too. I didn't catch your name."

"It's Sayulita." Beatrice abruptly shot up from her seat.

"I'll be right back." She ran out of the room.

—-

Greg skipped in front of Sara as they went through the cemetery. "I knew you'd believe me!" Greg put his frog in the front pocket of his overalls.

"I can't deny a glowing frog. Sorry about not believing you." Sara pulled her jacket over her hands. "We can't be out for too long. Your parents and my parents are going to freak out if they think we're missing."

Greg shook his head. "We won't be long."

—-

Wirt was sent to check on Beatrice. She was hunched over a large book and rapidly flipping through the pages.

"Your mom wanted me to see if you were okay."

"I'm fine." She hit a page of the book. "Found it! Come look." Wirt looked over her back at the book. "See here?" She pointed to the title. " _The Tale of Sayulita the Moon Child_."

Wirt glanced over the story. He gathered that the story was about the moon having a daughter named Sayulita who lived on Earth. It looked nonsensical to him. "So?"

"And look at this." Beatrice flipped the page. A drawing of Sayulita was on the page.

—-

Greg helped Sara pull out the thorny bush branch that hooked onto her jacket. It swiped across her hand when they managed to pull it out. Blood dribbled from her palm.

"You don't happen to have a bandaid in your pocket, huh?" Greg shook his head. "Figures. Let's keep going. It'll stop bleeding eventually."

—-

Sayulita was gone when Beatrice and Wirt came back. Wirt asked where she was. "Outside at the river." Beatrice's mother said. "She cut her hand by accident while cutting the pie."

Beatrice frowned. "How does somebody cut their hand while cutting pie?"

"It was weird. It was like the knife flipped out of her hand all of a sudden."

"Curses," the Woodsman muttered. "Boy, go outside to be sure she didn't wander off or get taken."

Wirt left without much argument. He leaned against the door after he closed it. Too much had been happening in the past few days.

An ever so familiar set of eyes peered down at him. "I need a favor lover boy." Wirt was confused. The Beast wasn't one to cut to the chase.

"What?" An axe was tossed at his feet.

"Kill the Woodsman."


	6. The Language of Flowers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"There is a language, little known,_  
>  Lovers claim it as their own.  
> Its symbols smile upon the land,  
> Wrought by nature's wondrous hand;  
> And in their silent beauty speak,  
> Of life and joy, to thosewho seek  
> For Love Divine and sunny hours  
> In the language of the flowers."  
> 

"Hey look, roses!" Greg pointed to a shrub bustling with multi-colored roses. "I've never seen blue and purple and orange and black and blue roses before." His frog croaked loudly, seemingly in agreement.

"You said blue twice." Sara pulled his hand away from the bush. "Careful, there's thorns. I don't want you to get hurt too."

"But I really want that one." Greg pointed to a perfectly red rose.

"Maybe later. We have to find your brother." Greg gazed at the rose for a second longer. He then nodded, moved his frog from his pocket to the top of his head, and continued to lead Sara through the forest.

—-

Wirt kicked the axe by the blade down the steps. "I'm not doing that. What's wrong with you?"

The Beast blinked, one eye at a time, and gave a gestural tilt of the antlers towards the forest. Wirt obediently followed.

"Sometimes if you listen closely you can hear the faint sounds of a hospital right here." Wirt, tired and skeptical, listened. All he could hear was the chirping of a random grasshopper and the early morning wind winding into a breeze.

Wirt crossed his arms. "I just hear forest noises."

"You'll learn to listen someday, lover boy."

"Don't call me that."

"And you shouldn't talk to me like that. I could end your entire existence just like this," the Beast snapped his fingers. The trees surrounding him and Wirt splintered and cracked instantly. Wirt heard a hospital then. If the hospital was filled with hundreds of dying trees screaming in agony.

Wirt covered his ears. "Okay, I get it! Make the trees stop screaming."

"Or I could make you start screaming." The trees were uprooted and thrown on the ground and the screaming immediately stopped. Wirt wondered if that was how trees were put out of their misery. "Now or later?"

"Now or later for what?"

"Listen: would you like to scream now or later?"

"Is there a never option?" The Beast chuckled. "What? What's so funny?"

"The fact that you believe that I would actually be considerate towards you is laughable." The Beast inched closer to him. "There will never be a 'never' option when it comes to me."

"Okay then. Later."

"Good." Wirt was patted on the shoulder. "Come with me this way." Wirt was walked back to the cottage. The dining room's lights were off. Wirt figured that everyone had gone to bed.

The moon illuminated the river. The waters were running faster than Wirt remembered. Sayulita was standing over the water and looking skyward.

"Did your former bird friend show you the story?" Wirt nodded.

"Yeah. Apparently Sayulita's the moon's kid. I didn't know the moon could have children, so that's pretty odd." The river's waters rushed faster.

"Tell me the story."

Wirt scratched the back of his head. He needed his hat. "She was born from a mirror made out of white copper or something. Then she got in an argument with a star and she was sent to the Earth. But not the outside world, right?"

"What do mean by that?"

"I mean, she isn't a real person, right? She's just an embodiment of the moon." Wirt sighed inwardly. It seemed that a common theme of the Unknown were humans that weren't really human. He was beginning to doubt if the Woodsman was completely human.

"The moon symbolizes many things. The important symbols for you to know are cycles and emotions." Wirt's shoulder was touched again. "And tonight we have a new moon. You should expect the beginnings of your screams if the morning ever comes."

"If? Is the sun not going to rise today?" His shoulder was squeezed.

"Possibly. I don't control the sky." The hand tapped along Wirt's shoulder before moving downward. "I retract my earlier request. It would've been foolish for you to kill the Woodsman."

"It's not foolish, it's just wrong. I can't kill people."

"You almost killed your brother."

"I don't have a brother. I'm an only child." The hand went from stroking to pressing into Wirt's chest. "That hurts." Wirt abstained from asking him to stop. Some of the trees were still whining in pain. Wirt did not want to end up like them.

"You'll let me in one day." The Beast's hand returned to his shoulder. "Kill the moon girl or old woman then. Your friends will suffer if you don't. And I know for a fact that you don't like seeing others suffer."

"Nobody likes seeing other people suffer." Wirt stepped out of the Beast's grasp. "Well I don't know about you though. But you said you're not a monster, so I guess you don't." Wirt looked behind him. The Beast had made an unannounced departure, as usual.

Wirt sighed. "He always leaves like that." He took a step towards the cottage door.

"I'm still here." Wirt jumped back. "I noticed that you have some poppies attached to your trousers." Wirt subconsciously traced over the crown of flowers. "Be careful. Poppies are deadly. Also, I have some gifts for you." A hat and bundles of flowers were thrown at Wirt's face. "Now I'm leaving. Goodbye lover boy."

Wirt placed his hat on his head. "Bye, I guess."

—-

Greg put his hands on his hips and frowned. "Why'd you stop?" Sara asked. She looked around. It was too dark to really see anything in the forest.

"I hear a weird noise. Do you hear it?" Sara strained her ears. All she could hear was the chirping of a random grasshopper and the early morning wind winding into a breeze.

"I don't hear anything. What's it sound like?"

"Beeping noises. Like the kind that machine makes in Wirt's room at the hospital."

"Oh." Sara slowed her breath and listened again. She still couldn't hear anything.

—-

Wirt closed the cottage's door carefully behind him. He bumped into a million pieces of furniture before he finally located Beatrice's room in the darkness.

"Beatrice, are you awake?" He whispered. A light from a normal lantern turned on. Beatrice was still sitting on the floor and was surrounded by books. "You can read in the dark?"

"No. What kind of question is that? I thought you were my mom, so I turned the light off." She moved some of the books beside her and motioned for Wirt to sit next to her. "Hey, you're back to normal. I was starting to get creeped out by your manliness."

Wirt touched his face. It felt normal again. "That's good. I was too, kind of."

Beatrice shoved two books into his lap. "I thought you were checking up on Sayulita, but I see that you decided to go flower picking instead." She picked up a stray red rose that was caught onto his shirt. "Geez, Wirt, how many flowers do you have?"

Wirt pulled out all the flowers that the Beast had thrown at him. They were all woven into wreaths. He picked up a bright yellow bundle of flowers. "I don't even know what these are for."

"Those are sunflowers stupid."

"Well, yeah, I knew that." Beatrice snatched the sunflowers from his hands. "I just don't know what they do. Like I have these poppies and they make you go to sleep when you wear them."

"I think I have a flower book around here somewhere." Beatrice shuffled through all the books. She then held up a small green book. "Get to reading your flowers. We could use these as weapons for later."

"Wait, what do you mean weapons?!"

—-

The sun raised, unlike what the Beast predicted. Wirt had bundles of flowers roped around his belt loops (courtesy of Beatrice), but with his hat and his teenage body back, he felt strangely at home with himself.

The Woodsman was sitting on the opposite end of the dining table. The lantern was next to him and was burning with a new light. "Temporary fix," the Woodsman said before Wirt could ask how the lantern was fueled.

Wirt sat next to him. The cottage was oddly quiet. Wirt knew that Beatrice was asleep, but her mother wasn't bustling around and her brothers and sisters weren't shouting and rampaging everywhere.

"Something has happened." The Woodsman said. "All the children are gone along with the mother. The girl and the woman have combined with one another too."

Wirt raised an eyebrow. Beatrice's mother could've been at work and the children at their version of school. He didn't feel too worried about them. But then again, were there even workplaces in the Unknown? Richard Cory and the couple with the endless house had became rich for a reason, but how?

"Sayulita and Miss Rosie are combined? That must be cool."

"No, it's not!" The Woodsman banged his fist on the table for emphasis. "They've combined into one person. Do you know what that means?"

"That they're one person now?"

"No! It means that there is a disturbance in the woods! The Beast created them, but they're not made of flesh and blood. They're sap and twigs and memories — disposable, bendable! The people whom they're based off of must be here right at this very moment." The Woodsman stood and grabbed Wirt's arm. Wirt was dragged to the window. A woman was standing by the river. The waters were turbulent. "Quick boy, who do they remind you of?"

Wirt thought for a moment. Miss Rosie didn't ring any bells. Sayulita rung a faint one though. A girl with a blue jacket and a soft voice and a sweet smile lapsed through his mind.

"Sara," Wirt said.

"Now tell me, who exactly is Sara?"

"This girl. I-I don't remember who she is, just what she looks like." The Woodsman sighed and released his arm.

"Good enough. You smell like a garden. Why?" Wirt shrugged.

—-

Greg held up a fallen sign from the ground. "It says that the next town is Clifton." He announced. He held the sign over his head and began to match. "Off to Clifton we go!"


	7. As the Cat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"As the cat_  
>  climbed over  
> the top of
> 
> the jamcloset  
> first the right  
> forefoot
> 
> carefully  
> then the hind  
> stepped down
> 
> into the pit of  
> the empty  
> flowerpot."  
> 

Beatrice was unperturbed with her mother's and siblings' disappearances. She chattered almost idly at the dining table with the flower book in one hand and fiddled with some random wreaths in the other.

"I want to test these flowers out, but it seems dangerous." She let out a tiny gasp after reading a few pages of the book. "If we had some rosemary or forget-me-nots we could get your memories back, Wirt."

Wirt nodded. "Let's just focus on what we have though." He held up the band of chrysanthemums. "What do these do?"

"Alleviates negative emotions," Beatrice and the Woodsman said simultaneously. Beatrice smirked. "Oh, so you're helping us now?"

"No, no. The words just spilled from my mouth." The man turned back to the window. Miss Rosie/Sayulita had not moved an inch away from the river, making the woodcutter concerned.

"Of course they did." Beatrice scoffed. She turned back to her book. "Hey, I got an idea."

"What is it?" Wirt leaned back in his seat.

"We're going to trick You-Know-Who." Beatrice waggled her eyebrows towards the ever anxious Woodsman. "We have thorn apples, right?" Wirt held up the correct plant. It differed greatly from the other crowns. Instead of bright blossoms settled on a soft stem for a headpiece, the thorn apples had a thick white root and didn't look very inviting to wear. "So, let's put those on a doll or a tree or something. Thorn apples cause disguises. We'll make the thing look like the weird lady outside and then stab it to make it look like it's dead."

Wirt's eyes widened. "Your plan to avoid killing people involves killing people you know."

"No it doesn't. See." Beatrice pointed to the thorn apple section. "It just makes a dummy if you put the flowers on an inanimate object. Please tell me you can stab a doll. I can't do everything around here."

Wirt gulped. He honestly didn't want to stab anything, period. He folded his hands together underneath the table and squeezed. "Fine." He managed to breath out.

Beatrice smiled. "Thanks Wirt." He tried to hold it in, but Beatrice's smile was infectious. When she smiled her eyes twinkled with a friendlier shade of brown and her freckles danced across her cheeks and nose.

She then returned to the book and called out more names of flowers. The Woodsman occasionally added a random fact about a plant that wasn't in the book.

Wirt allowed himself to be quizzed by Beatrice after they had identified every single flower. While flowers were at the front of his mind, the Beast occupied the back. What was the Beast doing as he plotted against him? Did the Beast already know what was going on?

Wirt shook his head and gave the definition of sweet peas. The Beast continued to linger like a shadow in his thoughts.

—-

Greg stopped Sara again to pick up a teapot. "Who would leave this out here?" He removed the lid and balanced the pot on his head. It wasn't as great as the kettle he had used for his elephant costume on Halloween, but it would do.

Sara was about to comment on Greg's new hat, when a crash made them jump. They were still at the town's entrance. "Want to go somewhere else?" Sara asked.

Greg shook his head. "There's an adventure here, I feel it. Right John Quincy Adams?" The frog croaked excitedly. Greg pointed his finger townward. "March!" He yelled out. Sara nervously walked behind him.

—-

Wirt managed to stab the Miss Rosie/Sayulita replica with much coaxing (and by "coaxing" the Woodsman and Beatrice grabbed both of his arms and forced him to swing the axe). He then was handed a headpiece of magnolias and shoved out of the door.

"Don't come back until she's a tree!" Beatrice then slammed the door behind him.

The river could laugh at what it once was. The waters were running at speeds Wirt had never seen before. Dead fish blasted out of the water's current laid across the river's sides like a gate. Frogs dressed in miniature suits and dresses were dragging suitcases away from the river. Wirt stared in awe at the walking frogs before going to the problem at hand.

The woman still did not move a muscle as Wirt approached her. He hesitantly tapped her shoulder. "Uh, Sayulita and Miss Rosie, are you two or one okay? You've been standing out here all morning."

"Rosie? Sayulita?" The woman's voice wasn't loud and gruff like Miss Rosie's or silvery and honeyed like Sayulita's. It was small, confused, and Wirt swore that he could hear a hint of an accent.

"You're somebody else?" The Woodsman had claimed that he saw the two woman walk toward each other and became one.

"I cannot move." Wirt didn't want to, but he had to cease the opportunity.

He silently reached up and placed the magnolias on the woman's head. He didn't want to, but Wirt had to look at her face to see if the effects were working.

The woman's eyes were a deep-set of violent. Miss Rosie's eyes were a dead shade of brown and Sayulita's were bright green. This woman definitely had to be a completely different person. Her hair was the shade of a tangerine versus Miss Rosie's and Sayulita's black hair.

Vines sprouted from out of nowhere and grasped the woman from all sides. Her eyes widened in surprise. The vines spread into branches and quickly covered every inch of her skin.

Wirt briefly closed his eyes as the woman began to scream into terror. When the screaming stopped and he opened his eyes, the woman was gone and a small tree blossomed with magnolias took her place. The crown was hooked onto the highest branch. Wirt hoped that the woman was going to be all right.

He ran back to the cottage and knocked softly on the door. Beatrice pulled it open. "Whoa. I've never seen someone turn into a tree before." She ushered him inside the house.

"You turned into a bluebird." Wirt pointed out.

"Which is completely different from a tree." She slapped the back of his head. "The Woodsman took the 'dead' body outside, so it's a matter of time before You-Know-Who gets here." The Woodsman handed Wirt the lantern back.

"We will be hiding in the coal cellar. Knock on the door three times when he leaves. Understand?" Wirt nodded. "Off we go. Bring some food girl."

"Way ahead of you," Beatrice held up a bowl filled with sandwiches and fruit.

—-

The source of the crashing sound had been nothing but a toppled wagon. Sara let out a sigh of relief. "I guess there aren't any monsters or anything here."

"Nope." Greg patted the upside down wagon. "There are a lot of feathers and barrels here though. That's weird."

"Says the kid with the teapot on his head." Sara tapped the pot with her knuckles. "Do you think that there's like an abandoned house that we can stay in? I'm really tired."

"March! Our mission: to break into a house and sleep!" John Quincy Adams croaked loudly in agreement.

—-

The Beast arrived shortly after Beatrice and the Woodsman escaped down the cellar. He beckoned Wirt outside the house and into the forest. "I have to say that I'm surprised. I thought that I was going to have to use forceful persuasion."

"Why?" Wirt hooked the lantern to his pants and closed his cape over it. It was much too bright for a lantern.

"There's poetry in brutal efficiency, lover boy." Wirt felt a hand thread through his hair. "Would you like another gift?"

Wirt shrugged. "Sure." At a blink of an eye his surroundings changed from the forest to a garden. Flowers surrounded him on all sides. Their combined smells were almost overwhelming. "Where are we?"

"An utopia you could say." Wirt's hat was removed by the Beast and replaced with a wreath of simple white flowers. "And now your reward." An odd, heated sensation spread through Wirt's stomach.

"W-What's happening?" He gasped. The heady feeling slowly spread throughout his body. The flowers, his mind blankly thought, but his fingers curled into his palms instead of reaching up and taking the flowers off.

"Pleasure is a wonderful feeling from what I know." The Beast laughed, the sound deep and coming from his throat. "Thank you for killing her, and that's sincere. The women became tainted and I was too busy to get rid of them myself."

Wirt felt hot. Too hot. His fingers functioned for long enough to remove his cape and undo his suspenders. He still felt hot. "Yeah. No problem." He managed to say.

"Even I make mistakes it seems." The Beast stalked his way to Wirt. "How do you feel?"

"I don't know." Wirt's cheeks were starting to heat up. He tried to unbutton his shirt, but his fingers were shaking and fumbling.

"In need of assistance?" Wirt nodded feverishly. The Beast laughed again as he undid the buttons one by one. His hands loitered at the hem of Wirt's pants. "Would you like to receive the full extent of your reward now?"

"I don't care." Wirt felt his trousers become undone also.

"This actually isn't a reward at all." Wirt really didn't care. He was too preoccupied with this new feeling. When he felt a pressure against the crotch, he remembered to breathe again. "Consider it a punishment. I don't remember planting a magnolia tree by the river."

The Beast reached into the fabric of his underwear. Wirt's mouth hung open wordlessly and he couldn't respond. His thoughts were becoming more muddled than usual. Instead of the flowers he thought about the Beast. The Beast's eyes were growing sharper by the second and his hand was too soft to be real.

And then the Beast grabbed and Wirt was done for. His breathing subsided into shudders. He grabbed the Beasts's arm, the closest thing to him, and held on. He didn't have time to process what the arm felt like when the Beast began to squeeze.

"Must be nice," the Beast murmured. Wirt wholeheartedly agreed. It was too nice.

Starbursts of random access memories suddenly flowed through his mind as the Beast's grip tightened. The time when he was cold and the air had nipped at his nose too badly and his mother had given him a cup of hot cocoa to warm up was in his pelvis. The time when he had taken a cardboard box and decided to slide down a hill in it and nearly broke his wrist was in his stomach. More and more memories appeared and the whooshing and wobbling and warm and crazed feeling was tingling and peppered onto every inch of his body now.

And, oh, did his body feel electric. When the Beast began to move his hand across his length, it was practically singing electricity.

Wirt was aware and unaware at the same time. Unaware of the flowers that were beginning to curl at his feet, aware of memories flowing back into mind, and all too aware of the sensations flowing through him.

Everything then came to an end. Right after he climaxed he was pushed onto a bed of flowers.

"Take a good look around lover boy because this will be your new home for a long time." Wirt closed to eyes to the Beast laughing.

—-

Upon awakening Wirt felt… smaller. Incredibly smaller. He was no longer in the garden. He hoped that the Beast had changed his mind and let him out.

Wirt felt himself tingle. He let the Beast out of his mind.

Wirt tried to stand only to fall back. He looked down at his legs. He saw paws. His hands and feet were gone and had been replaced by paws.

Wirt panicked. He looked around the room. He was on a dresser of some sort and there was a mirror right above it. He tripped over his newfound legs while trying to run to it.

He looked into the reflection of the mirror with wide eyes. A cat stared back at him. Wirt gasped, tripped off the dresser, and swiftly fell into the flowerpot below him.


	8. Dream of the Evil Servant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Looking over the flowered verandah she said:_  
>  Who are you to think you are beautiful?  
> What have you got to show?  
> Go sit on your rag.  
> All my life I tended to looks,  
> they betrayed me. I bore you.  
> I am wretched. Be my mother. Be my maid."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is drug use and implied child death in this chapter.

_III_

Wirt scrambled back to his feet. No, paws, he was a cat now. There was no plausible reason as to why. Was it the Beast's doing? Most likely.

His nose twitched and his ears perked. Someone was coming into the room. Wirt stretched on his hind legs and clawed at the flowerpot. "Hey, can somebody get me out of this pot?" He called out.

"What was that?" A man's voice rumbled.

"Sounded like a cat." A woman said. She suddenly squealed and Wirt could hear clapping. "Did you get me a cat? I've always wanted one Emery!"

"I would never give you a cat. I despise animals." Wirt then heard footsteps approaching.

He clawed at the pot again. "Can I get some help?" He yelled. Two giant gloved hands grabbed him by the middle and pulled him out of the pot. Wirt relaxed in the arms. "Thanks." He said.

The man holding him, Emery (the name sounded familiar, but Wirt didn't feel like thinking about it), frowned. "Why won't it stop meowing?"

"So Beatrice gets to talk when she got turned into a bird, and I can't?" Wirt huffed. Finding a way to become human again was going to be two times as frustrating now.

The woman squealed again. She had green eyes to rival Sayulita's and her hair was piled high on her head. She scooped Wirt from the man's hands. "She's so cute! And look, she has a red little bow on."

Wirt huffed. "I'm not a girl." The bow around his neck was starting to become itchy.

"It's annoying." Emery put on a coat. "Put it outside. I don't know how it got in the house."

"But Emery, she's just a kitten." Wirt looked between the man and the woman. He was definitely not about to become their house pet for one out of nine lives. He tried to wiggle out of the woman's hands.

"I don't care. Send it outside."

"But—"

"Audrey." Wirt's ears perked again. He felt one of them start to twitch.

"Audrey?" He repeated. He took a good look at the woman. Ever since his—"session"—with the Beast, his mind had grown clearer. The name Audrey held importance somehow. He was going to wait until it came to him. Wirt learned that stress doesn't help any situation the hard way.

Emery scowled down at the cat. "Fine then. Keep it. We'll have the pay the help extra to take care of it though." Audrey cooed and held Wirt to her chest. He felt suffocated.

"Oh, thank you Emery! Now hurry and get to work before you're late." She kissed his cheek. "I love you." Emery repeated the phrase and hurried out the door.

Wirt squirmed around again. "Where am I?" He said to himself.

"Oh, you need a name don't you?" Audrey's hold on him grew slack for a moment. Wirt seized the opportunity and jumped. He made a miscalculation and landed in her apron pocket. He was just falling everywhere today.

The woman laughed. She scooped the cat from her pocket and held him in the air. Wirt felt sick from being swung around. "Well, you're brown. I don't think I've ever seen a brown cat before. So many names: Syrup, Toast, Whiskey, Cocoa, Tawny, Chocolate, Brownie—"

"How about Wirt?" Wirt attempted to snort, but it came out as a weird gagging sound.

"Oh, you like that name? Brownie it is!" Wirt felt his eye twitch. That was the most ridiculous name that he had ever heard of.

The doorbell blessedly rang and Wirt was set down. "They must finally be here." Audrey opened the door widely. A cold breeze flew into the house and chilled Wirt's nose. He pawed at it in an attempt to get warm. He was sure that he looked like the dumbest cat on Earth.

Wirt looked up after the door shut. A woman and two boys were in the house. They all looked familiar.

"I am sorry that we took so long. We got lost in the city while trying to locate your home." Wirt peered up at the woman. All he could see were fiery strands of hair that beat Beatrice's in any contest.

Wirt decided to take a chance. He pounced on the woman's foot and clawed at her leg.

"I did not know that you had animals." The woman held him up. Wirt took a good look at her face.

"The river lady?" Or at least, someone with remarkable resemblance to her. Tangerine colored hair and eyes like two drops of wine; Wirt was not mistaken. He closed his eyes in fear that she would turn into a tree again, but he felt a warmth against his face. He opened his eyes to find that she was happily holding him to her cheek.

"We had a black cat in France." The woman stroked his fur. Wirt involuntarily purred. "His name was Raven."

"That's lovely, that's lovely." Audrey clasped her hands together. "What exactly are your names? I don't know how to pronounce them."

The river lady set Wirt down. "I am Marie-Françoise Héroux." She placed a hand on the shorter boy's head. Wirt couldn't see his face clearly. He assumed that the boy was around his age. "This is my son Benoît." She then placed a hand on the other boy's hand. Or man. He looked around eighteen or nineteen to Wirt. "This is Napoléon Côté. Even though I did not give birth to him, he is still like a son to me."

"How adorable." Audrey's voice suddenly grew dry. "You're going to have to go by new names now that you're in America. You all will be Mary Hert, Benjamin Hert, and Richard Cory from now on."

"Richard Cory?" Napoléon's voice was dryer than Audrey's.

"Oh well, I think it's a lovely name. Unless you prefer Gregory? I've always been fond of that name."

"No. I just find it funny that you're naming me after a suicidal, rich guy." Audrey laughed cooly.

Wirt stepped back at the scene as Mary and Audrey discussed living and cleaning negotiations.

A picture came to Wirt's mind. After he studied everyone's face, everything clicked. Audrey and Emery were his great- or great-great-grandparents. His mother kept a framed photo of them and their servants in her room.

Wirt only asked about the servants once. He was curious about why they were servants and why the woman in the photo was frowning. _"They called her Rosy Mary since her hair was so red, but you can't really tell from this picture. She was always mad about something apparently."_

And Wirt had never met Audrey or Emery personally. Only through his mother when he occasionally asked about her. _"He was very quiet and tough. And she would be hot one second, and then cold the next."_

Wirt could see. The playfulness in Audrey while she was holding him was replaced by a cold frown.

"You all will be staying in that room." Audrey pointed behind her. The hall looked big and ominous from Wirt's perspective. We ran away from Audrey and followed the family.

—-

Wirt felt like he had weights hooked onto his eyelashes. He tried to open his eyes for them to only be closed again. "Sleep lover boy." Wirt grumbled and let slumber take him again.

—-

_II_

Wirt was back to his cat body. He clawed at the ribbon around his neck. It wouldn't budge.

He decided to silently walk around the home and think. It was good that he hadn't actually turned into a cat, but why was he dreaming that he was one? And the dream was extremely lucid. He could hear, smell, and feel his surroundings perfectly, if not better than before.

So, was he dreaming about the past? He tripped over his feet. "I'm supposed to be graceful." He jumped back up and kept walking.

Wirt was split between two hallways. He decided to go down the hall that he was following the French family down.

The walls were painted a light shade of blue. A single door was in the back, hidden away from the rest of the house. Wirt gently pushed on the door. It was open.

The room inside had peeling deep blue wallpaper and three cots lined up against the wall. The odor of smoke overwhelmed Wirt's senses, making him paw at his nose and twitch irritably.

"Ben?" Wirt recognized the voice as Mary's. He walked over to where she was laying. "Oh, just the cat."

"A little help?" Wirt wasn't even going to try to jump on the bed. Mary seemed to get the message and placed him next to her.

Mary had a sheet wrapped around her waist and looked sad. "What's wrong?" Wirt asked. He rubbed against her side to signal what he was trying to say. Non-verbal communication was hard, especially as a cat.

"She is gone." Mary took a puff from the cigarette she was holding. "And they have a child right after. It is like they are dangling what I cannot have right in front of my face." She gestured to the small table next to her. Wirt clambered over her sheeted legs to get a better view. There was a small black urn and a glass ashtray.

"Oh." Wirt was still confused. Somebody died. Perhaps it was one of the boys, since Mary mentioned a child.

Mary took a long drag from her cigarette. "I was going to name her Godeliève, after my grandmother." Wirt was even more confused. It wasn't one of the boys then. "And then they named their child Godiva. They are making fun of me, I know it. They are just mockingbirds disguised as humans."

Wirt stroked her side again as he searched through his memories for a Godiva. He had a great-aunt named Godiva who died when he was very young. She had spoken to him once, but he could never remember what she told him. Wirt's mother was never very fond of Godiva for reasons unknown.

"I stuck diaper pins into the baby." Wirt leaned back in surprise.

"Why'd you do that?"

"You are quite the conversational feline." She stroked behind his ears. "Go on now. I have to get as much sleep as possible." Wirt was then pushed off the bed. He brushed himself off and went down the other hallway.

There were hushed voices coming from one door. Wirt pushed against it and it opened. His great-something-grandparents needed to lock their doors.

The two boys were outside. The moon was out and numerous stars illuminated the sky. Wirt had never seen so many before.

"France is better." The taller boy commented while looking skyward.

"Shut up Naps. Why are you always so negative? Enjoy something for once."

"Whatever Beastie Ben."

"Don't call me that." Ben snarled. They jabbed at each other some more before walking. Wirt hurried on his short legs to chase after them.

"I swore that I saw a lotus tree somewhere." Naps' voice rang throughout the darkness. Wirt felt the ground turn into mud. "It's just around the corner, I swear."

"Why am I even here? I should be getting some sleep right now. We have to work tomorrow."

"We have to work everyday. I would have used force anyway. There's poetry in brutal efficiency."

They continued to talk about more random subjects while looking for the lotus tree. Naps talked about how it was considerably harder for him to heal from frostbite since he was naturally colder than the normal human being and that they should ransack the now moved-out house next to them. Ben talked about how his mother was growing more and more bitter by the day and had stopped crying over Godeliève recently.

Wirt was exhausted when they finally reached the spot. Ben growled. "These are just lime blossoms. I told you that there was no such thing as a lotus tree."

Naps laughed. "I guess I'll try harder tomorrow. You are quite the little botanist, aren't you?"

Ben shrugged. "I don't know, I just like flowers and trees a lot. Can we go back inside now? It's getting cold."

"No. Let's sleep under the stars since I'm so unappreciative of them." Ben sighed.

Wirt crept closer to them. They laid their jackets on the forest ground and settled down on them.

"And then what are we supposed to do in the morning?" Ben asked. "Mrs. Audrey isn't going to be happy if we don't make breakfast."

"We'll make it in time. We're waking up early anyway."

"Why?"

" _Faire l'amour à l'aube._ " Wirt's ear twitched. He should have taken French instead of Latin at school.

—-

Greg eventually found a house that he found suitable enough. The inside of the home was simply white and there was barely any furniture.

Sara collapsed into the chair next to her. "I am so tired. I could just pass out right now."

Greg had to admit that he was feeling a little tired too. He climbed into the chair adjacent to Sara and curled up in it.

"The Hunting of Wirt is postponed until tomorrow." Greg yawned. "Nighty night."

"It's still daytime silly." Sara made herself comfortable. She ran her fingers over the cut on her hand. It had stopped bleeding a little while ago. Now it was a matter of time before it scabbed over. "Goodnight anyway."

—-

Wirt's eyes opened long enough for him to register that he was lying underneath a ripe lime tree and that a crown of lime blossoms had fallen off his head.

—-

_I_

Wirt was sitting by the front door. Mary suddenly bursted into the house. Her hair was running wild and tear stains tracked her cheeks. She slammed the door shut and leaned against it.

Wirt decided that it was best not to bother her. He heard Audrey run to her with a look of surprise. "You're back already?" She asked. "Where's the baby?"

Mary shook her head. "There is no baby." Wirt stood up. So that's what happened. Godeliève was a lost child.

"Oh. Well I'm very sorry about that." Audrey gave the Frenchwoman an unsentimental pat on the shoulder. "Now go change. My son will be visiting us at any minute and I want everything to be perfect."

Wirt looked up at Mary. Her entire body was tense. Her hands clenched to fists at her sides. "Fine." Wirt trotted after her into the kitchen.

Mary took out an appropriate amount of china plates and placed them on the counter. She glanced down at Wirt. "Move cat." He obeyed. Wirt ran to the entrance of the kitchen.

Mary dropped two of the plates on the floor. Audrey immediately ran into the kitchen. "What are you doing?" She asked.

"My hands slipped. I am sorry." Mary moved one of her hands behind her back. Wirt saw blood drip onto the floor.

Audrey huffed exaggeratedly. She dug into her pocket and took out some crumbled dollar bills. "Go unwind with a film. You're in no state to work."

Mary gladly took the money. "Thank you." She walked amply to the door.

"And if you come back here smelling like smoke, I swear that I'll cut your wages in half!" The door slammed shut again.

—-

Beatrice stuffed the last sandwich in her mouth while the Woodsman was distracted.

"It has to have been a few hours by now. The boy must have been taken by the Beast into the woods." Beatrice nodded and tried to swallow the sandwich. The Woodsman caught her. "Did you just eat the last one behind my back?"

The sandwich finally went down. "I did. And it was delicious." The Woodsman turned around again and climbed up to the cellar's exit.

"I ought to lock you in here for doing such a thing." Beatrice climbed up the ladder in an instant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy thanksgiving! <3
> 
> i went through and edited all of the chapters (nothing major, just some dialogue and grammar changes). if the story gets confusing, don't be afraid to ask what's going on lol.


	9. The Bean Eaters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Two who are Mostly Good._  
>  Two who have lived their day,  
> But keep on putting on their clothes  
> And putting things away.
> 
> _And remembering . . ._  
>  Remembering, with twinklings and twinges,  
> As they lean over the beans in their rented back room that  
> is full of beads and receipts and dolls and cloths,  
> tobacco crumbs, vases and fringes."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Implied suicide in this chapter.

Greg and Sara were startled awake by a gunshot. They both stared at each other with wide eyes. "Where did that come from?" Sara whispered. Greg shrugged. His frog jumped out of his pocket and walked across the floor. Sara's eyes widened even further. "First he glows, now he walks?"

"Abraham Lincoln is a very special amphibian." Greg followed his frog across the floor. The frog stopped at a door opposite from the front that Greg and Sara hadn't even noticed. Greg quickly opened the door and the frog hopped into the darkness.

Greg looked back at Sara. She was still standing by the seat. "Let's go Sara. Adventure!" She shrugged and followed after him.

After nearly tripping down the stairs, they found themselves in a long hallway with endless, colorful doors.

"Where's the source of that gunshot?" Greg mumbled to himself. The frog walked over to the long dining table. A gun glinted on the tabletop and a man rested his head against it.

"Wirt?" Sara gasped. Greg glanced between her and the dead man and frowned. The man had a curled mustache and eyes that protruded like a lobster; nothing like Wirt.

"That's not Wirt." Greg said. Sara stared at the body.

"If it's not him, then it sure looks just like him." Sara frowned also.

—-

Wirt felt well-rested when he finally woke up once and for all. He hears the Beast from his right side, humming an eerie tune. "Beast?" Wirt called out. The Beast materialized in front of him. "Hi." Wirt scratched the back of his head. Where was his damn hat now?

"Salutations."

"I was having these weird dreams."

"Weird dreams?" The Beast did his famous cock of the head. "Oh do tell me."

"Well, there were three dreams in total. I was a cat with a red ribbon in each of them an—"

"Cats symbolize power, misfortune, and sexuality. The color red symbolizes danger, shame, rejection, and sexual impulses and urges." The Beast heartily chuckled. There was something disturbing in the Beast's laughs to Wirt. "Two definitions having to do with sexuality; it sounds like you're trying to indirectly hint at something to me."

Wirt felt his blood pool in his face. "Y-Yeah I guess, but in a second. You didn't let me finish." The Beast's laughter stopped. "I was a cat and I was just running around my great-grandparents' house. Then they hired this family from France to help them out, and the woman's baby died when I woke up."

The Beast didn't even blink. "You dreamt of the past and nothing more." He moved closer to Wirt. "Did you just willfully say yes? You're not under the influence at all."

Wirt leaned up against his elbows. "Under the influence of what? Flowers? No, they're over there." Wirt pointed to where the wreath had fallen. The Beast didn't look.

"Oh." The Beast placed both of his hands on Wirt's shoulders. "You'll dirty your clothes. I just replaced them." Wirt looked down on himself. His clothes were starched terribly and all of his collected flowers and the lantern were gone.

"I don't care." Wirt shakily rose to his feet. His legs wobbled slightly and his head felt heavy. He wasn't sure if it was a side affect of the flowers or from his prolonged sleeping spell.

The Beast traced his finger along his shoulder blades. "You say that a lot, 'I don't care.' Indifference is not the correct attitude to have."

"Sorry." The Beast ran his hands over his frontside. Wirt involuntarily shivered. "But my dreams were just about the past? That's all?"

"Yes, that's all." An undertone of a hiss was in the Beast's voice, but Wirt wanted to press on.

"Wait, what do—" The Beast squeezed him suddenly. Wirt jolted. "W-Wait. There's this phrase in French that I—" The Beast squeezed again and stole Wirt's breath.

"I occasionally find silence to be a beautiful thing." _Squeeze_. Wirt closed his eyes. "Don't you agree? Tell me, what else is beautiful?"

Wirt opened his eyes. He didn't want to play the Beast's games now. "Not the clarinet." He grabbed the Beast's arm in urge to continue.

"I didn't know that you were a clarinetist. We should organize a concert right now." The Beast's chuckled at Wirt's frustration. "All in good fun lover boy."

Wirt's body didn't course with the same electricity as it did the first time. He still felt a trail of sensations wherever the Beast dragged his hands though.

In the midst of fondling and swelling, the Beast asked, "May I enlighten you in a couplet?" Wirt could barely get a breath through his reddening lips. He opted for a head shake instead of speaking. "Why not? I'm in the couplet type of mood at the moment."

"N-No." Wirt gasped twice.

"Already? The flowers made you last forever." Wirt silently watched the Beast manipulate and stretch the white stickiness between his long, dark fingers.

—-

The Woodsman packed another sandwich for safekeeping before he tugged on Beatrice's arm to take her out of the cottage.

He huffed as he slung a bag over his shoulders. "First, we'll look for that stupid boy. Second, we'll look for your family. Got it? I will not repeat myself."

"I don't have a family." Beatrice remarked. The Woodsman stopped dead in his path. Beatrice knocked right into his back. "Why'd you stop? I thought we had to find what's-his name."

"You do have a family. A mother and an infinite amount of brothers and sisters." Beatrice shook her head. "Then tell me who's in your family then, since I know nothing."

"I'm an orphan and I don't have any brothers and sisters. You must be confusing me for some other redheaded girl who lives in a cottage by the river."

"I am pretty sure that you are the only redheaded girl who lives in a cottage by a river." The Beast poked her in the forehead for extra emphasis. As he did a petal loosened from her hair and fell against his finger. He felt a silver of its effects when he touched it.

Beatrice quipped the Woodsman against his ear while he was distracted. "Don't poke me."

The Woodsman grabbed her arms and shook her. More petals came out her hair and even from her clothing. Beatrice snapped at him during the entire shaking, but he only sighed. "What did you do?" He muttered to himself.

—-

Wirt thought that the cat dreams were over. They apparently weren't.

The home seemed darker and gloomier. Wirt felt an ominous atmosphere but couldn't pinpoint why.

He heard voices carry from the blue hallway. He hurried down and opened the door with his paws.

The two boys were on the bed. Mary was gone. There were various things on the floor: glass beads broken from a necklace or bracelet, receipts, little paper dolls, squares of cloths, laces and fringes, tobacco crumbs, and Godeliève's urn. Wirt sat behind the urn just out of sight and listened.

"She couldn't have just run into the woods and hang herself. She was shaken up over Godeliève, but not to an extreme."

"C'mon, it's Halloween and Mrs. Audrey is finally letting us for trick-or-treating. I'm going to wear a teapot and go as an elephant. What about you?"

"A teapot…? Never mind. The point is, we need to go see if it's true."

"No offense, but your mom was going a little loony these last days. I can believe it."

"You know what?" Wirt jumped back from a foot that nearly crushed him. "I'll just go out to the woods by myself and find her."

"No." Wirt moved out the way of another foot. "I'll just go out myself. Whether she's fine or gone, we're going. Put a sheet over your face if you're going to mope all night long."

There was a pause. Wirt crawled towards the door as it grew. "Thanks Naps."

Wirt ran to the front door before any near-crushing could happen. He felt a strange wave of wind blow into his eyes. His vision changed ( _And I was just getting used to cat eyes_ , Wirt whined in his head) to completely black and white.

It was hard to tread through the monochromatic world. His usual trot was gone and he was left with a weird stagger, as if he was drunk or his leg was broken.

Ben came into view suddenly. "I'm going to get more beans Mrs. Audrey!" He called out.

"Hurry back!" Audrey called back. Wirt struggled to get to Ben as he put on a coat and scarf.

"Hey cat." Wirt's world spun as he was picked up. He felt like he was going to be sick. "You don't look too well. I'll take you to the veterinarian after, okay?" Wirt was tucked into the pocket of his coat. It was warm and just big enough for Wirt to curl into and take a nap, but he kept his head poked out. It was his duty to not miss a thing that happens.

They (or Ben) walked through the forest slowly. Wirt still felt uneasy. The lack of color wasn't helping and danger was thick in the air.

Ben stopped in front of the line blossom tree that they other boy had confused for a lotus tree. Wirt heard Ben sigh. " _Faire l'amour à l'aube_." Wirt repeated the words in his head. He had to ask the Beast what the words meant when he woke up.

Ben screamed and Wirt nearly fell out of his pocket. He smelled everything before Ben said it. "Napoléon? _Maman_?" Wirt peered up. There were two bloodied bodies swinging in the trees. He had a feeling that their deaths weren't self-inflicted.

Ben took them down carefully. He could smell smoke radiating from Mary like a pipe and Naps smelled like a candy shop.

Dark fog flew in at all directions. Frightened, Wirt's new instincts told him to jump from the pocket instead of tucking inside of it. So he did.

The ground was gooey; too thick to be mud. Wirt figured it was wet sand.  
A deep chortle echoed throughout the silence of the forest. Wirt recognized it immediately. The Beast. He was then startled out of his dream.

The Beast was standing over him with his glowing eyes. The garden had darkened a few shades and the flowers' odors had toned down.

"Beast," Wirt swallowed the lump forming in his throat. He didn't know why he was so nervous all of a sudden.

"Yes?"

"What does—okay I might pronounce it wrong; I took Latin not French—' _faire l'amour à l'aube_ ' mean?" The Beast stood at a standstill. "Uh, Beast? Are you okay?" He blinked once and saw Beatrice's cottage in front of him. He was transported out of the garden just like that. Wirt's nervousness actually meant something.


	10. A Love Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"I am alone_  
>  The weight of love  
> Has buoyed me up  
> Till my head  
> Knocks against the sky."

Wirt looked up at the magnolia tree. Pink blossomed all over the branches. They looked extremely close to cherry blossoms, but Beatrice had made sure that he knew better. 

He put his hands behind his head and ran his fingers through his hair (Wirt forced himself to accept the fact that his hat was never going to touch his head again) and let out a deep sigh. 

"So you're Marie-Françoise Héroux?" He asked the tree. The blossoms began to shake slightly. "Or Rosy Mary." The delicate flowers shook themselves off the tree. They caught onto the breeze and flew over the river and to beyond. Some of the leaves began to turn a ripe amber color. 

Wirt caught some of the flying flowers in his hands. "I wonder why the Beast kicked me out." More and more flowers flew. All the leaves on the tree were some shade of yellow now. "I guess he doesn't now French either." The branches shook slightly, as if in agreement. Wirt let the flowers go. "I don't understand how you worked for my great-something-grandmother. Must've been a lot of hard work."

Something dropped onto his face. Wirt wiped it off and looked at the sky, expecting rain. The sky was starting to change color, but there were absolutely no clouds out. 

More droplets fell. Wirt sat up and looked at the tree. Honey or some type of sap was pouring by the bucketful from the tree. Before he could react, Wirt's head was covered in nectar slime. 

"That's it. I'm making a new hat." He stood to his feet and wiped the honey away from his eyes. He looked back up at the tree to see why it was leaking all of a sudden. He saw that the sky had changed again. It was blending into a golden color like the tree sap. 

Wirt opened and closed his mouth in thought. Was the Beast nearby? He looked around. All he saw was the abandoned cottage, the calmed river, and the golden tree.

"Beast?" Wirt still called out hopefully. He heard a cr-r-ruck overhead of him. A black bird, a raven he assumed, was aimlessly flying around the honied skies. 

Another bird joined the lone raven. Then another and another; until the too many birds for Wirt to count filled the sky. It didn't take long for the sky to turn black with all of the ravens. 

Wirt almost fell back from how far he was straining his neck to look up. 

A white light blinked at him. He had a suspicion that it was an eye. More eyes simultaneously opened and gleamed and blinked at him like stars. 

Wirt felt the ground move underneath him. There were earthquakes in the Unknown? Well, he thought, if there's talking birds, psychedelic flowers, and soul lanterns, then there might as well be earthquakes. 

He felt the ground continue to shift underneath his feet. Then it all stopped. Wirt looked down in confusion. His feet were no longer on the ground. 

His arms and legs automatically started failing around, trying to grab at the grass, but he was already too high up. He grasped for the tree and barely caught onto a branch. 

"Why am I floating?" He yelled at himself. He looked back up at the sky. There were no more birds or eyes. It looked like a normal night sky. 

He felt his hand start to slip. 

"No, no, no, no." The honey from the tree was loosening his grip. He tried to grab onto the branch with his other hand, but gravity (or the lack thereof) beat him to the punch. 

Wirt then commenced to fall into the sky. 

—-

The Woodsman checked over Beatrice's clothes and hair for any more hidden violet petals. "No more." He placed his hands on his hips and gave a congratulatory nod to himself. 

In the process of the flower search, all the pins in Beatrice's hair were taken out. Waves of uncombed fieriness were everywhere. Beatrice huffed and tried to gather her hair from out of her eyes. 

The Woodsman helped her to her feet. "Why did you do such a thing? If you had used too many violets then it could have resulted in—"

"Short term memory loss and permanent amnesia, I know. You're not the only flower expert." Beatrice weakly smiled. The Woodsman frowned. "I just couldn't bear the thought of being without my family." She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair again. "Violets cause a little daydreams. I just wanted to forget about it for a little while. You know?"

The Woodsman let out a sigh also. "Yes, I know. I know the feeling well."

—-

A door opened in the distance. Sara whipped her head around. She pulled Greg away from the body and held her finger to her lips.

Footsteps were approaching. Greg grabbed his frog and Sara's hand and ran to the nearest door. 

Sara patted the wall for a light switch and let out a breath. "That was a close one." 

"Hey look, a portal to space!" Greg pointed to the large, swirling vortex implanted in the wall. Sara blinked. Cosmogyral rocks and blinking stars were spinning in circles like cereal in a bowl of milk. Greg placed his frog properly in his pocket and marched forward. "Adventure!"

"No, wait Gre—" He had already stepped inside of the portal. Sara ran to it and looked inside. She couldn't see a boy nor frog in the twinkling darkness. 

Sara glanced back at the door. Maybe the people that were coming could help get Greg from the portal. The footsteps were getting louder. Yet they sounded more and more ominous by the second instead of hopeful. 

Sara stared at the door and debated in her head until the knob began to turn. She looked between the door and the portal. 

She sucked in a breath, tightened her jacket around her arms, and jumped inside the portal when the door opened. 

Sara felt like she was falling. She opened her eyes and her stomach dropped. She was falling. And heading fast for a giant rock. She held her arms out and braced for impact, but it never came. 

"What took you so long?" Sara opened one eye and saw Greg and the frog walking towards her. "And why are you hugging yourself?"

"Because I thought I was going to crash." Sara let go of herself and looked around. She wasn't sure if she was really in outer space. There were too many stars, maybe even billions, surrounding and spinning around and she could breathe and move perfectly fine. "Where are we?" She absently asked. 

"We're on the moon silly!" Greg tugged on her jacket sleeve. "C'mon. Me and Martin Van Buren found these weird, antigravity craters. They're like trampolines, but better!"

—-

Wirt checked himself over. He miraculously managed not to hurt himself during his descent. And he also miraculously landed on the moon.

"How am I getting out of this one?" He murmured to himself. He kicked the stray rock by his foot. The rock bursted into white powder and got all over his pant leg. 

Wirt muttered to himself and tried his best to wipe the powder off, only to make it spread and start to stiffen his starched pants. 

Wirt was disrupting from groaning about his pants by the sound of voices. He strained his ear to listen. He was not looking forward to meeting moon aliens, but he needed help to get back to the Unknown. 

"Hello?" Wirt called out. The voices stopped suddenly. "Hello…?" He cautiously called out again. Wirt began to move backwards. Maybe moon aliens in the Unknown weren't friendly and had a diet consisting of awkward, brunet, pubertal boys with a horribly stiff pant leg. 

"Was that Wirt?" 

Wirt froze. The voice sounded familiar. It was girl's, soft and reassuring. He felt too creeped out to call out or go to the voice. 

"I think it was. Let's check it out." A pause. "William McKinley's floating away!"

"How do you know more presidents than me?"

Wirt broke out of his stupor and ran towards the voices. They had seemed to momentarily forget about Wirt and were lightly bickering over a runaway frog and presidential history. Which Wirt hoped they continued to do. If they stopped talking, he wasn't sure if he would find them. The Unknown's version of the moon was gigantic even though sounds reverberated easily. 

On the topic of the lunar resonance, the birds flying behind Wirt made an obvious attack. 

It sounded like there was an army of birds behind him. Wirt made the mistake of looking back. The birds were different than the ravens and blackbirds that had sucked him into space. They were small with black breasts, white backs, and yellow tails. They blended in and stood out from the darkness and stars at the same time. 

They all swooped down on him at the same time and aimed for his head. Wirt swatted them away, but the birds were relentless. 

Greg and Sara sounded like they were having a jolly good time on the other side of the moon while Wirt was being stalked and preyed on by a hoard of birds. Not to mention that the honey in his hair was starting to dry and stick his hair to his forehead and his powdered trousers was making it harder for his leg to move. 

He wondered why he was cursed. Bad things always happened to him and never his brother. Wirt could never figure out why he was star-crossed child. 

More and more birds were coming and Wirt started to panic. They squawked and flapped their wings in his ears and pecked at his hair and shoulders nonstop. 

—-

Greg launched himself off of Sara's shoulders and managed to grab his frog by the leg and pull it back to ground. "And William Henry Harrison was only president for 32 days, because he got a cold and died." He said when he landed. 

Sara nodded. "Your knowledge on presidents is spectacular. You must always get A's in social studies."

"No. Social studies' my worst subject." He balanced the frog on his teakettle. "Let's get out of this crater and find Wirt. He didn't sound that far away."

"It hopefully won't take us long to find him." Sara offered Greg her hand. "I'll help you up." She pushed him out of the crater and then jumped out herself. "I wonder if the real moon's like this."

"Nope. We would've been dead by now." Greg deadpanned. 

A bird from out of the blue swooped in and over their heads. "Birds on the moon, walking frogs, a land behind a cemetery wall; what's next?" Sara looked forward. There was a tornado of birds ahead of them. 

Before Sara and Greg could react, all of the birds scattered at the same time. 

—-

The eyes and smirk of the Beast replaced the darkness that the birds had caused. "Traveling by birds is wonderful, isn't it?"

Wirt spat out a feather. "No." He glared at the Beast. 

"Feeling cocksure today, are we?"

"No? And could you not say that weird again?"

"Cocksure, cocksurely, cocksureness," the Beast singsonged. "Anyways, how was the moon?"

"Horrible. I got attacked by birds and I can barely move my leg."

"How sad. Do you want for me to hold you and wipe your tears and kiss your fears away?" Wirt shook his head. "Oh really? When we were in the garden you—"

Wirt held up his hand. "Can we not talk about that? My head really hurts right now." A cup appeared in front of Wirt's face. He hesitantly took it. "What's this?" The liquid in the cup was tinted red and sweetly scented. 

"Rose tea. It helps alleviate pain. Either drink it or I'm taking it back from you."

Wirt took a sip of the tea. It was wishy-washy. "You gave me a rose technically." He slowly said. 

"Not technically, I did give you a rose. It's just in liquid form. Why are you staring at the cup like that, hurry up and drink it."

"Roses mean love. So you, uh, love me?"

The Beast's eyes ringed red. "Even if the pitiful emotion called love existed, I would not show it towards you, out of all people and things in the universe." Wirt shrugged and tried to drink the tea again. He couldn't stand how watery it was, but his head was feeling tremendously better. "Love is nothing but a primal feeling that humans use as an excuse to engage in sex with one another."

Wirt shrugged again. "You're so negative."

"Says the hypocrite." 

"Well, when you think about it we sort of… you know, and you're helping my headache. That means that you must care about me."

Three rings are red were around the Beast's eyes. "I don't, and will never care about you. The Garden Incident was nothing. I don't know how you managed to get such a ludicrous idea over herbal tea."

Wirt took a step back. He managed to bump into a tree. "Everything has a meaning?" He tried. 

"Goodbye lover boy. Have fun navigating through the forest alone." And the Beast was gone.


	11. Decisions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Decisions,_  
>  Directions,  
> Conflicts,  
> Connections."

Greg and Sara managed to return to the Unknown in one piece. They both held up white copper coins in their hands that read, "Thanks for visiting! You can't come again!"

"The moon must be an one-time vacation spot." Sara chuckled and pocketed the coin. 

Greg's frog took his coin. "We were so close." The boy took the teakettle from his head and set it off to the side of the endless dirt path. "Wirt says I get distracted too much. Mr. President distracted me. We could've found him if I paid attention."

Sara, at a lost for words, could only rub the boy's shoulders. "It's okay. We'll try again tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" Greg shook his head. "No, we have to stay! We were so close to him, he has to be nearby."

"I'm sorry Greg, but we've been here too long. We'll come back tomorrow after school."

"Do you promise?" Greg held out his pinky finger. 

Sara enwrapped her finger around his. "I promise. Now let's go."

—-

"Whoa," Beatrice grabbed the Woodsman's arm and pointed at the small clearing ahead of them. "There's a bunch of scarecrows over there."

The Woodsman walked ahead to the scarecrows silently. There were many short ones and a few tall ones, all wearing familiar clothing. 

Beatrice, also silent, touched the smallest scarecrow's arm. It had a potato sack for a head with a frozen button smile and a wooly shirt, assumedly a young boy's. 

The Woodsman didn't need to say it out loud. He always found that stating the obvious in a time of need never helped in any way whatsoever.

He touched the arm of the tallest scarecrow. The pillowcase head covered in blush, a wide smile, and wild red hair and decorated with a blue petticoat spoke quite loudly. 

"That one's different." Beatrice pointed to the scarecrow at the very end. The Woodsman just glanced at it. It had a pumpkin for a head instead of sacks and cases like the rest. 

Beatrice studied the outlying scarecrow. The pumpkin was bursting with brown and black feathers for hair and wore a black cape. A wooden bucket was at its feet. Beatrice kicked it. It fell apart. 

The Woodsman then decided to look at the outcast scarecrow. "What did you break?" His eyes widened at the broken bucket. 

"Must've been old," Beatrice shrugged. "This is so creepy. We should go."

The Woodman pinched the pumpkin scarecrow's cape in between his fingers. It was the same crocheted thread that he would never forget. 

"I don't know who this one is." Beatrice said. 

"I do!" The Woodsman ran ahead through the trees on the right side. Beatrice gazed at the scarecrow family one last time before chasing after the woodcutter. 

—-

Wirt leaned against the nearest tree and tried to order his thoughts around. He barely had any moments to sit down and think to himself since he sacrificed himself for his brother. 

He started with the bare necessities: he was hungry. Very hungry. He could feel his stomach gurgling. The last thing he had eaten was a sandwich that Beatrice handed him before he met with the Beast. 

He rubbed his stomach to stop the rumbling. The only food he saw were dark berries in a bush next to him, and he wasn't going to take his chances with them. 

Wirt's mind felt undisturbed now that his memories were officially back. He remembered his mother, his step-father, his little brother, and he now properly remembered Beatrice. 

Homesickness started pouring in. It was probably better when he had amnesia. Thoughts of his family and the real world pressed heavily against his heart.

Beatrice and the Woodsman briefly came to mind. Wirt wondered if they were still in the cellar or not. 

Lastly, the Beast. Their visits together were growing shorter each time. "I wonder where he is too." Wirt said out loud. He kicked a nearby pebble and sighed. 

"By the river," a voice whispered in his ear. Wirt jolted upright and looked around. He didn't see anybody. 

"Near the cottage," another voice whispered. 

"Underneath the moon."

"With the birds."

Wirt spun around on his heels. The voices were coming from all directions. "Who's there?" He asked. 

"The trees are."

Wirt looked at the tree he was leaning against. It was one of the trees with a permanent expression of agony on it. 

"I forgot." Wirt murmured. 

"Go to river," another tree said. 

"There's the Beast." 

"Who you want."

Wirt looked in the direction of where the majority of the trees were. "Thanks, but I don't know how to get there." 

The trees slowly moved their branches and pointed ahead, making a dark path for Wirt. 

"Go find him."

"No more whining."

"Yeah, stop whining."

"I don't whine." Wirt mumbled. He followed down the path. The trees didn't try to make any conversation with him during journey. A spat sap at him when he accidentally ran into it though. He just wiped the sap off his stained clothes and kept going. 

The cottage was thankfully not far. The trees moved back to place right when he stepped foot outside the forest. Wirt thanked them, got no response, and went ahead. 

The Beast wasn't hard to find (for once). He was standing in the long shadow of the cottage and faced the river. The birds that had assaulted Wirt were perched across the Beast's antlers and were chirping quietly. The Beast occasionally nodded and even chuckled once at the birds. 

Wirt slowly stepped forward. He tried not to step on any stray leaves and rocks on his way to the Beast. 

"Hey." Wirt called out. All the birds immediately scattered in all directions. One managed to fly right into his nose before taking off. 

"You interrupted the discussion." The Beast slumped against the cottage. 

—-

Sara helped Greg and his frog down from the garden wall. It was still dark out. "That's so weird. We were over there for at least a day and probably only a few minutes have passed here."

"Yeah, it is weird." Greg still looked blue.

Sara smiled. "I got something for you." She pulled out a red rose from her pocket. It was still unnaturally red. She half-expected for the colors to dim down after bringing it to real world. She stuck the rose in Greg's overall pocket. 

"Thanks." Greg's smile came back. 

"That's my Greg." Sara steered him to the cemetery entrance. "Let's go back now. I have no clue what time it really is."

—-

"Wow, you have a lot of energy for an old man." The Woodsman shot a glare at Beatrice but kept on running. 

"And you have a low stamina for an adolescent."

"Well, I was a bird for a while, so I'm not used to even walking yet. And I'm wearing a dress!"

The Woodsman suddenly stopped. Beatrice barely missed bumping into his back again. "What is it now?" She flipped her hair from her eyes. 

"I don't recall this shack being here." Beatrice stepped from behind the Woodsman and walked towards the shack. "Wait! There could be danger in there."

"Race you to danger then. Loser has to make sandwiches!" Beatrice rushed on to the shack. The Woodsman scrambled after her. 

The Woodsman felt intense nostalgia hit him. If only red locks were replaced with brown ones. 

—-

Wirt moved to the Beast's side. There was nothing exciting about the river or the moon. The tree was gone. A destroyed crown of magnolias laid in its wake. Rosy Mary was nowhere in sight. 

"The birds informed me that your younger brother and friend have left the Unknown. Willingly might I add in case you think that I had anything to do with their departure."

"Oh." Wirt let out. "Oh." He repeated. He honestly didn't know how to respond. He heard their voices on the moon just moments ago, and now they were gone. 

"Is that an 'oh' in surprise, anger, disappointment, joy, or reactance?"

"I don't know. I guess disappointment." Wirt let out a shaky breath. 

"Well, I should join the Oh Celebration also." The Beast turned to face him. "Oh, look. It seems that what I had predicated did not come true. You only experienced memory loss and dependency. Interesting. The Woodsman was in the depressive state before you arrived." The Beast tilted his head. "A deal is a deal. I lie, but I do take promises seriously." He snapped his fingers. The trees obediently cleared a path. "Go now, the path's homeward-bound."

Wirt turned to the path.


	12. Little Boy Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"Little Boy Blue,_  
>  Come blow your horn,  
> The sheep's in the meadow,  
> The cow's in the corn.
> 
> Where is that boy  
> Who looks after the sheep?  
> Under the haystack  
> Fast asleep.
> 
> Will you wake him?  
> Oh no, not I,  
> For if I do  
> He will surely cry."

Wirt turned back to the Beast. He took in a slow breath. He felt his lungs slowly inflate and deflate with each molasses-paced breath — dimly reminding him of the balloons at the assembly of that fateful night. He needed confidence. Just a tiny ounce of it. For some reason, he thought it was hidden in the air.

"I'm not leaving until you tell me what the dreams were about." Wirt's voice came out shakier than desired, but managed to let the words out. Mission accomplished for now.

"Go now, the path's homeward-bound." The Beast repeated. The trees' branches began to sway violently, as if they were beckoning for Wirt to hurry along the path.

"I won't leave until you tell me." Wirt crossed his arms underneath his cape. He felt more like the intimidated than the intimidator.

"Go." Wirt shook his head. The Beast stood at a standstill. Shadows crept from the Beast towards Wirt. They danced and leaped across his feet, but Wirt held his ground.

The shadows increased in size along with the Beast. He still stayed in the long shadow of the cottage and leaned over towards Wirt. His eyes burst in various colors directly in front of Wirt's face. Wirt didn't budge.

"You don't even have to tell me everything." He said. The Beast's eyes settled down. "Just one question: were you ever human?"

The Beast returned to his still stance.  
His multiple irises continued to bounce around in a last attempt to scare Wirt, but the boy was still looking at him determinedly. The Beast had to give it to him. The boy had some strength hidden somewhere in that bony little body of his.

"I was never a human." The Beast backed away some from Wirt's faces. The shadows retreated also. "I recollect that I was always a monster."

Wirt took a step back also. "You told me that you weren't a monster though."

"Of the forest, no. I am not the Great Monster of the Forest as some like to say. But metaphorically speaking, yes, I am a monster. A terrible monster indeed."

Wirt looked down at his feet. His pant leg was still stiff and his shoes were chalked with moon dust. He felt the smallest twinge of empathy towards the Beast. "Hey, don't say that." Wirt grimaced at his own words. He was the worst at comforting.

"I can say whatever I like." The Beast pointing to the aggressive trees. "Now go home before I change my mind."

—-

Beatrice won. The Woodsman grumbled about how she had cheated with the surprise run. "You have to be prepared for everything." She smiled, gloomily.

The Woodsman opened the shack's door. Orange light escaped and washed across him and Beatrice. It took the both of them a moment to register that a family was seated across a long table and were smiling and laughing over plates of food.

One girl stood up from the table. "Dad?" She said to the Woodsman. Beatrice silently watched the two hug.

A question was knocked off the tip of her tongue as she was wrapped into a hug also. "Beatrice, you're back!" One of her sisters said.

Beatrice kicked the bundle of violets away from the doorstep and hugged her brothers and sisters back.

—-

"I'll leave when you answer the question." Wirt's hands were trembling from underneath his jacket.

"I take back everything that I have said about you. You are just a stupid impulsive boy with a strange lust for a monster." The Beast's eyes seethed red. "Go. Home."

Wirt's hands stopped trembling. "Fine." He turned around to the trees without another word.

He felt branches brush against his back as he walked. He wasn't sure if the trees were attempting to comfort him or if they were pushing him away. For now, he felt like he was being pushed. "Get off of me!" Wirt moved the branches away from him. He heard one snap.

Wirt let his anger fade for a moment. He needed to calm down before he went home.

"Ugh." Wirt rubbed his hands over his eyes and looked around. His surroundings were unfamiliar. He looked behind him. He was still on the path. Was the Beast making him take the long way or something? "Stupid Beast," Wirt continued on.

Wetness landed in his hair. Wirt flicked it off. He didn't care if the trees decided to spit at him for breaking one of their branches. He just wanted to get away from the stupid forest, the Beast, and the entire Unknown.

More and more wet patches appeared in his hair and clothes. Wirt huffed and looked up at the trees. Their mouths were closed, but the sky's was open. Grayness covered the sky and snow was falling.

Wirt only got more annoyed. It was the perfect time for snow.

The snow was coming down fast. Piles of snow were around his feet in an instant. Wirt hissed between his teeth. His stiff leg was caught in a magically appearing snowbank.

Wirt pulled at his foot. He was beyond annoyed now. His leg wouldn't budge. "Oh come on," Wirt huffed. He kept pulling on his leg. Nothing.

Wirt wrapped both hands around his leg and tugged on it as hard as he could. He only fell over face first into another pile snow.

He heard another snap. It sounded more solid than a tree branch. Wirt dug his hands through the snow he had fell in. There weren't any branches there.

Wirt rolled over onto his back. He quickly dug his hands into the snow that his foot was caught in and freed it. He couldn't feel his foot.

Wirt grabbed onto the nearest tree trunk and tried to stand. He could barely move his foot.

"Frostbite?" Wirt muttered to himself. He knew that it wasn't frostbite.

Wirt leaned against the tree and nearly fell again. The tree had a hollow in it. He climbed into it and curled as much of himself inside of the hole as he could, mindful of his numb foot.

He tried to let his body relax inside the little warmth that the tree provided, but it wouldn't. Wirt felt restless and angry and now a little scared.

—-

Sara somberly greeted Greg and his mother. They didn't answer; both of their eyes were on Wirt's heart monitor.

—-

Wirt shook himself awake. He shouldn't go to sleep in the middle of the sudden snowfall. He was out in the open and who-knows-what was lurking out in the forest.

He forced himself out of the tree and back on the path.

Wirt refused to look at his foot. Pain was slowly but surely starting to take over his leg. He tried to ignore it. He filled his mind with poetry to distract from how weary he was and how much his foot was starting to bruise.

The path started to wind and twist. Wirt knew that that was unnecessary. His foot couldn't take anymore dragging from sharp turns.

On the fifth or so turn Wirt was prepared to give up. Yet there weren't anymore turns or trees or snow. The sun was shining through a clearing.

Wirt forced himself to the clearing. It wasn't home. It was a meadow of poppies.

Wirt sighed. He was done. The Beast must have purposefully led him off course.

He dragged his leg out into the meadow. It looked like it would be a safer place to rest than the forest. He let his body collapse when he reached the heart of the meadow.

—-

Beatrice laughed at a joke that the Woodsman's daughter said. She stopped laughing suddenly. "What's wrong?" Beatrice shook her head.

"I just remembered something, but I forgot what it was." Beatrice leaned against the table. "Sorry. What were you saying?"

-—

The Beast chuckled as he reached the meadow's edge. "Did you learn your lesson?" He called out to Wirt. "You should learn to respect me."

Wirt slowly turned to the source of the voice that said his name. He waved it off. "Yeah, whatever." He bundled a group of poppies and laid down more comfortably on them.

"Get up now. Poppies are dangerous."

Wirt shook his head. "Can't. Foot's broken." He felt like sleep was punching him in the face. Wirt yawned and curled up into the flowers. "Later," he yawned again.

"No. Get up now."

"Later." Wirt yawned again. He was ready to become best friends with sleep. They had been together for a while now.

The Beast sighed. He would go out to the meadow to kick the boy awake, but he couldn't. It was too bright. In hindsight, he should've picked a shadier area.

The Beast snapped his fingers. A coyote appeared immediately. "Get him." The Beast ordered. The animal ran into the meadow. It grabbed Wirt by the collar and dragged him towards the Beast. The coyote fell asleep before it could even take Wirt to the meadow's edge.

The Beast huffed. He summoned up all the animals that he could think of; from wild dogs to wild cats to birds and even deer and butterflies. One by one, the animals fell asleep around Wirt.

The Beast watched the boy's chest rise and fall. It wouldn't be long until he was far gone and the Beast was not risking going out into such a bright sun.

Wirt was surrounded by the red flowers and sleeping animals. He almost looked majestic, almost.

"Well, farewell lover boy. Until you decide to wake up."

-—

Flatline.

One of the nurses handed Greg a poppy and told him to wait outside with his mother and friend.

—-

The nature of the beast is not to cry, so the Beast turned his back to the slumbering Wirt and animals and poppies and faced the forest.

He sung his favorite song to himself as he went through the forest. He stopped singing when he found himself back at the meadow.

—-

"He was mean sometimes, and gave up easily, but he was a great brother in the end."

"Can you tell me more about Uncle Wirt?"

Gregory patted his child's back. "How about you ask your mom about him? I'm busy right now." In reality, he had nothing to do.

—-

The Beast led his new accomplice throughout the forest. He wasn't big on tours and he didn't like his new "assistant" at all. He was hoping to confuse the young man by showing him every acre of the forest and then changing the layout the next day.

"What's over there?" The young man asked. The Beast didn't have to look to see where he was pointing.

"Why do you need to know?"

Shrug. "I overheard some people talking about a Boy of the Meadow. There's a boy and bunch of animals who're stuck in this meadow. Maybe that's the meadow over there."

"The meadow is in fact over there. But if you visit it, I'm destroying the lantern." The young man reflexly held the lantern to his chest.

"Okay, fine I won't go in there. Just don't hurt N—"

"Yes, yes, I won't. Now let's go." They continued on.

 


End file.
